Over the holidays, I watched dozens of back episodes of Fox Broadcasting’s “24,” and not once saw rogue counterterrorism agent Jack Bauer stop for a court warrant — not even when he sawed off the head of an informant in an elaborate sting operation to stop a nuclear bomb from going off in Los Angeles.

This is how the president wants us to see the real world. Indeed, George Bush is the Jack Bauer of presidential power. There seem to be no rules in Bush’s world when it comes to the war on terror. Only wimps like the whining bureaucrats on “24” would balk at torture, spying, propaganda — whatever it takes.

Just like Bauer, played with such engaging intensity by Kiefer Sutherland, the president cannot be faulted for his goals. At any cost, he is trying to protect Americans from terrorists. But just like Bauer’s frustrated superiors, Congress has its hands full in deciding what to do about Bush’s determination to reach his goals by any means necessary.

The debate Congress will engage in coming weeks is as old as the Constitution itself. Do presidents have inherent power to do just about anything they want to do, if it is for the right reasons? In other words, is anything legal if a president does it for national security?

This debate goes well beyond the intricate details of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which Bush admitted sidestepping in ordering warrantless monitoring of Americans who have contact with foreigners. The president’s vigorous defense of his actions should alarm even his most partisan supporters on Capitol Hill. While assuring us that he is not seeking “dictatorial powers” after news leaked of his warrantless surveillance orders, the president liberally defined his powers under the Constitution in a way that would make strict constructionists squirm, saying he “absolutely” had the power to ignore FISA, created by an act of Congress.

Republicans in Congress face a tough choice: Should they protect and defend their party’s president, or protect their branch of government from him? Similar assertions of executive authority by past presidents, repeatedly cited by the Bush team and their supporters as justification for his actions, only serve to put Congress in more of a bind. Failing to draw a line in the sand now would ratify the behavior of a series of presidents determined to claim authority to conduct surveillance without any judicial oversight.

Perhaps there isn’t much left of congressional power in the national security arena. Bush and his advocates have the luxury of decades of legal precedents to cite in arguing for an executive prerogative to do anything he likes in wartime.

The difference now is that we are in a war against terror that could last a generation, or longer. Giving in to the president could mean that Congress implicitly cedes unlimited wartime powers to the executive branch forever.

There is some irony in Bush’s liberal reading of his constitutional powers. What happened to his passionate defense of strict constructionism, the idea that interpreting the Constitution should not go beyond the strict intent of its founders? Often, the president rails against judges “legislating from the bench.” But in pushing aside congressional standards for obtaining surveillance warrants, Bush is legislating from the Oval Office.

For instance, the president wants the most restrictive interpretation of the Constitution when it comes to a right to privacy, the underpinning of abortion rights. But turn the debate to his own executive power and suddenly he is willing to go way beyond the intent of the framers, who labored mightily to limit the presidency to what Alexander Hamilton described as “much inferior” to the British monarch. That is why they made the legislative branch Article I, relegating the executive to Article II.

Bush’s assertion of war powers not only challenges congressional authority. He seems convinced that civil liberties are a secondary matter. Consider the official White House response to the Dec. 24 report by The New York Times that the National Security Agency has been engaging in a much larger domestic spy program than the Bush administration admitted to a few days earlier. White House spokesman Allen Abney said, “This administration has fought and will continue to fight the war on terror while trying to uphold the individual liberties of Americans.” At least they are trying.

Of course, the White House will probably label its libertarian critics nothing more than a bunch of wimps who choose liberty over stopping terrorists. I guess I am one of those constitutional wimps. Even the reality cop shows get me riled, as we watch the police routinely trample the individual rights of hapless suspects.

Maybe we do live in a Jack Bauer world, where constitutional liberties must take a back seat to stopping killers. But I’d rather live in Patrick Henry’s world: “Give me liberty or give me death.”

Contributing Editor Craig Crawford is a news analyst for MSNBC, CNBC and “The Early Show” on CBS. He can be reached at ccrawford@cq.com.