ACLU Wiretapping Case Thrown Out

The ACLU, defender of civil liberties (so long as you're not conservative, white, male, or Christian), sued the NSA over the supposed illegality of the NSA's executive-ordered wiretapping. The case was thrown out by a federal court in Cincinnati on the grounds that the plaintiffs couldn't actually prove that they were being wiretapped and thus had no standing. It seems a bit of a hazy ruling on some level - how do environmental groups who aren't actually developing cancer thanks to industrial waste get standing to sue? But the judge's ruling in the matter concisely lays out why they couldn't hear the case and overlook the plaintiffs' lack of standing:

The plaintiffs allege that the President, as an actor in our tripartite system of government, exceeds his constitutional authority by authorizing the NSA to engage in warrantless wiretaps of overseas communications under the TSP. But this court, not unlike the President, has constitutional limits of its own and, despite the important national interests at stake, cannot exceed its allotted authority. . . . It would ill behoove us to exceed our authority in order to condemn the President or Congress for exceeding theirs.

(emphasis my own, h/t Bench Memos)