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WashingtonPost:

A high-profile Republican effort to clarify the legality of President Bush's warrantless wiretapping program will almost certainly not pass before Congress recesses at week's end for the fall campaign, leaving the legislation in deep trouble, congressional leaders conceded yesterday.

Efforts to reach agreement on a single version of the bill that could be brought before the Senate and House this week foundered yesterday on the insistence of key House members that they vote on a House version that they say is significantly tougher than the Senate's. House Republican leaders are deferring to the House bill's primary author, Rep. Heather A. Wilson (R-N.M.), who is locked in one of the tightest House election contests of the season.

"I don't think that's possible," Wilson said of the House and Senate reaching agreement on a compromise bill. "Our focus has to be on passing the House bill."

House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said GOP leaders would still like to pass a bill this week "but that may be a bit of a stretch."

Failure to act this week would jeopardize Congress's ability to ever authorize the National Security Agency's surveillance efforts, which Republicans see as vital to national security but which many Democrats and civil libertarians regard as unconstitutional. GOP leaders say that if legislation is not completed, they will revisit the issue in a lame-duck session of Congress that will be convened after the Nov. 7 elections.

Good luck with that lame duck session. If the Dems manage to retake even one chamber of Congress, there's no way this legislation will get through. Nor should it.