This analysis of the judicial smackdown given to the manifestly illegal NSA wiretapping program breaks it down very clearly:

Since its disclosure last year, President Bush’s warrantless domestic surveillance program has been denounced as unlawful by the vast majority of legal experts, Republican and Democratic members of Congress and even conservative commentators.

Last week, a federal judge joined this growing chorus with a stinging opinion that found Bush had violated the Constitution and federal statutes in ordering the National Security Agency surveillance program. In striking down the controversial monitoring program, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor chastised the government for a flagrant abuse of the Constitution and, in a direct message to the president, observed that there “are no hereditary kings in America.”

While Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales insists that the legal authority for the program is clear and filed a notice of appeal with the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, few experts outside of the Bush administration support the program. To the contrary, federal law seems perfectly clear in prohibiting warrantless surveillance. Even leading Republicans, like Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), have denounced the surveillance program.

The far more difficult question is the implication of Taylor’s ruling. If this court is upheld or other courts follow suit, it will leave us with a most unpleasant issue that Democrats and Republicans alike have sought to avoid. Here it is: If this program is unlawful, federal law expressly makes the ordering of surveillance under the program a federal felony. That would mean that the president could be guilty of no fewer than 30 felonies in office. (Emph. added.) Moreover, it is not only illegal for a president to order such surveillance, it is illegal for other government officials to carry out such an order.

Read the whole thing. It’s worth it.