I argue in Human Events today that the renewed debate over reforming FISA would provide a useful measure of whether Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are serious enough about national security to be president. I’m not holding my breath waiting for them to be pressed on it at tonight’s debate. Nor, were they to be pressed, would I expect them to distance themselves from the hard Left’s determination to reject any compromise that sensibly immunizes the telecoms from lawsuits for acceding to the Bush administration’s requests for assistance after 9/11 — such as the proposal adopted by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in the Senate Intelligence Committee (which is being fought tooth and nail by left-wing interest groups and senators like Chris Dodd and Pat Leahy). But if they were pressed and they did distance themselves, I believe they’d help themselves a lot.