The Bush Administration and congressional Republicans have watched liberals distort and misconstrue the modifications made to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) last week. They’ve seen enough and aren’t going to take it anymore.

In the past few days, conservatives have begun to fight back against what they perceive as a deliberate attempt by liberals to engage in scare tactics and invoke the threat of “Big Brother.” Much of the activity has taken place on liberal blogs, as noted by Dean Barnett, the New York Times and The Hill. But it’s also being fueled by the ACLU and other civil-liberties groups.

The White House took the first step to rebut the distortions when it released a fact sheet about the Protect America Act, the temporary FISA fix that Congress passed on August 4. That law expires in six months.

Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R.-Mich.), ranking member on the Intelligence Committee, has led the charge in Congress. He wrote a scathing letter to the New York Times, chastising the paper for resorting to “scare tactics” that “knowingly and willfully” misrepresent the law. (Full text of the four-page letter is available here.) Hoekstra followed up the letter with an op-ed in the Washington Times calling out Democrats for their short-sighted views.

The reforms passed by Congress were designed to update FISA with current technology, not to expand it beyond its original intent. At stake is the ability of the U.S. intelligence community to monitor foreign targets outside the United States. The law will get another review when Congress returns from its August recess, leaving open the possibility that Democrats could weaken it. Liberals are fully engaged on this fight, which is why conservatives can’t ignore it.