Sensenbrenner Explains

Okay, now it makes some sense. He didn't want to let those undisciplined ditherers over in the Senate Chamber ummmm dither for six months before dealing with the PATRIOT Act (ie, pushing the debate into the primary period for next year's elections).

The shorter extension, Sensenbrenner told reporters, would force swifter Senate action and had the support of the White House and Speaker Dennis Hastert, R.- Ill.

"A six-month extension, in my opinion, would have simply allowed the Senate to duck the issue until the last week in June," Sensenbrenner told reporters.

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he Senate was expected to consider the five-week extension in a brief session later Thursday.

Democrats, meanwhile, did not bat down the bill to extend the Patriot Act until Feb. 3.

"The amount of time is less important than the good-faith effort that will be needed in improving the Patriot Act to strike the right balance in respecting Americans liberty and privacy, while protecting their security," said Sen. Patrick Leahy (news, bio, voting record), D-Vt., the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee.

"We're happy to agree to a shorter-term extension of the Patriot Act," said Rebecca Kirszner, an aide to Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "The important thing is to strike the right balance between liberty and security."

House passage marked the latest step in a stalemate that first pitted Republicans against Democrats in the Senate, then turned into an intramural GOP dispute.

Without action by Congress, several provisions enacted in the days following the 2001 terror attacks are due to expire. Bush has repeatedly urged Congress not to let that happen.

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Most of the Patriot Act — which expanded the government's surveillance and prosecutorial powers against suspected terrorists, their associates and financiers — was made permanent when Congress overwhelmingly passed it after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington.

Making permanent the rest of the Patriot Act powers, like the roving wiretaps which allow investigators to listen in on any telephone and tap any computer they think a target might use, has been a priority of the administration and Republican lawmakers.

Some civil liberties safeguards had been inserted into legislation for renewing that law but Senate Democrats and a small group of GOP senators blocked it anyway, arguing that more safeguards were needed.