Have these newspaper reporters ever heard of contingency planning? Repeat after me: "Con-tin-gen-cy plan-ning."
Contingency planning includes legal powers as well as military planning for eventualities. Naturally the president would want to know what his powers are in the case of a national emergency like 9/11.
This propaganda ploy is getting very, very tired. If clinton did it, they would all marvel about how smart and on the job he was, preparing for anything that might happen (between golf games, world tours, and fund raisers).
Another one of those "magnificent grasp of the obvious" articles from the MSM. The law in national security is basically what the President says it is. President Ford issued an executive order prohibiting the assassination of foreign leaders. Another President could issue a "finding" laying the predicate for overturning that order. You just have to play the politics that go along with those orders and find support.