The New York Times radio station was trumpeting it as a “sweeping rebuke to President Bush,” while elsewhere on the dial Sean Hannity blasted it as the latest liberal attack on America’s security.

Here we go again. Where you stand is decided by the fringe on which you sit. In that case, put me squarely in the middle.

The Supreme Court’s ruling blocking the Bush administration from trying scores of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay in military tribunals is not the end of the world, or of Bush’s presidency.

In essence, the ruling is merely a procedural decision that embodies basic American values.

The court made clear that the Bush plan for military tribunals it rejected can easily be remedied with new legislation.

In fact, I believe the decision may prove to be a wise one for America’s security, even though it seems to give the terrorists a temporary victory in our own courts. I say that because now Congress will have to take a stand on the issue of how the worst of the worst, those the government wants to charge with war crimes, including Osama bin Laden’s driver, will be dealt with. The days of Congress, both parties, sitting back and second- and third-guessing Bush as he aggressively carries out the war on terror are over. It’s time for America’s representatives to be counted. Are they for us or against us?

The war on terror is settling into a new, slower phase. Phase One began with the aftermath of 9/11, when emotions ran sky-high and the sense of urgency dictated policies that were almost purely chief-executive driven. Congress was right to say “amen” to virtually everything the White House wanted, and Bush thrived as he pushed the boundaries of executive power. That he sometimes pushed them too far was the point of Thursday’s ruling.

Had such rulings occurred regularly in the early years, say 2002 or 2003, they would have signaled an American unwillingness to face the facts about a new kind of enemy.

Al-Qaida and its evil offshoots’ legal process amounts to masked men reading a death sentence before beheading innocent and helpless civilians. Or sending dopes into marketplaces and weddings wearing suicide belts.

We’re not like that. We’re Americans, and we believe in laws, even for mad-dog killers. And it has become increasingly clear in the last year or so that we cannot permanently sacrifice our basic values in the pursuit of victory. Part of the reason is that Iraq has become more quagmire than lightning strike and even Afghanistan seems less secure than it did when the Taliban were first rousted. Worse, Islamic fascists are exploding around the globe and there is a growing awareness that our struggle is not going to be quick or easy.

The war has become more marathon than sprint. And so we have to pace ourselves for the long haul. That context is sprinkled throughout the court’s ruling and the individual judges’ opinions.

“Where, as here, no emergency prevents consultation with Congress, judicial insistence upon that consultation does not weaken our nation’s ability to deal with danger,” Associate Justice Stephen Breyer wrote in joining the 5-3 majority. “To the contrary, that insistence strengthens the nation’s ability to determine — through democratic means — how best to do so. The Constitution places its faith in those democratic means. Our court today simply does the same.”

Breyer is right. It never hurts America to play by its own rules. Quite the opposite. The embarrassing disclosure of torture at Abu Ghraib did more to undermine our cause than anything the terrorists threw at us. If we want to spread democracy, we have to live democracy. Even when it’s inconvenient.

The court’s ruling doesn’t mean we have to bake cookies for the captured terrorists, or afford them every right of our civilian courts. The military tribunals that Bush wanted are still the right way to deal with those who have engaged in terrorism.

Surely Congress agrees?