I think I smell something burning....

[Mickey]

Definition of "emergency" would send this into another gray area.  Would losing the "chatter" about an attack that may be weeks away by losing track of a chain of conversations constitute an "emergency"?  I would say that under several circumstances it could. 

 

Do you have an idea of how many communications like this we are talking about?  (I do not which is why I am asking.)  If we are talking a handful per week, then it wouldn't be terribly onerous to meet this requirement.  If we are talking 100's or 1,000's, I could definitely see this becoming a paperwork nightmare.

 

I do appreciate your attempts to help me understand the legalese of this issue.

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Because it is a classified program and because there is no investigation being undertaken, we just don't know the numbers. We do know how many applications for orders (for some reason they don't call them "warrants") there are each year because they have to report it to congress. For example, there were 1,758 in 2004. About 2,000 a year is what they are averaging at this point.

 

Of course, one emergency situation could cover 100 taps. For example, field agents could say that there is an emergency such as a potential attack and submit a list of names or something to the AG and say that they are all ivolved so we need to tap them all right away. That way, the AG authorizes a whole bunch all at once in the same e-mail or whatever he does to "authorize" the taps.

 

The Act forsees a situation where Person X is of interest to agents and so they want to tap his phones, any communication device he is using. You start out with a person whose identifiable and known devices which he is expected to use for communication. Maybe what they are doing is essentially searching a stream of data they are tapping into with certain technical abilities to find a drip here or a drip there worth further, particularized investigation. If so, they wouldn't have a "person X" or even known devices to tap.

 

A good analogy would be the difference between knowing a bad guy is going to be at the Ralph on a given sunday and wire tapping his seat. That would be easy to get a FISA order. On the other hand, some enterprising agent might suggest that there are a lot of people going to the Ralph on Sunday to see a game, 75,000 or so. If there were a terrorist there and there could be with so many people there, if we could listen to all the "chatter", the stadium din, and use fancy software to sort through it, we might be able to get the seat number of anyone who says "Muhammed". We could then focus in on that person x and see what he is up to. A google search only the database is a sea of actual conversations going on in a stadium rather than text across the web.

 

FISA, I don't think, would be able to address that because that was not the kind of surveillance Congress wanted to legalize. Its not covered because its illegal was meant to stay that way. I am pretty sure that we wouldn't that kind of seraching or surveillance going on. If the CIA or NSA could listen in to every single private conversation in the United States with perfect accuracy and be able to identify all terrorists cells in the US, if that technology existed, would we want it used? If the technology was really there for big brother to know all and see all, not metaphorically but actually, would we want them to?

[YellowLinesandArmadillos]

There was no oversight by democrat and republican representatives alike, not even close.  A handful were informed of the program and told it was classified so that if they breathed a word of it, they were comitting treason.  They were not shown who was being tapped, no details, nada, zip, zero.

 

Sorry, this is the same lot that told us all about WMD's, I'm not trusting my constitutional rights to their promises.

 

Please tell me why it is that the ability to tap anyone they want for up to a whole year for the low, low price of simply informing a few congressional big wigs and the FISA court is not enough?

 

Really, if this were a democrat doing this, the impeachment hearing would be in their tenth week by now.

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Just a point of clarification. There cannot be adequate oversight by the out party because they do not have the ability to schedule hearings, issue subpoenas or independently investigate the executive branch. In this case Republicans have successfully blocked every attempt to do, as an example, denying and shutting down the investigation into the NSA controversy. Press has paid little attention to this despite Democratic protests. This is what happens when you have no check on the Executive Branch.

 

On the other hand you have to tolerate B.S. investigations like Whitewater and Presidential sex habits. The only thing Dems can do is invite testimoney of folks with knowledge of to but not participants in the Administration or its ongoing scandals.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

Just a point of clarification.  There cannot be adequate oversight by the out party because they do not have the ability to schedule hearings, issue subpoenas or independently investigate the executive branch.  In this case Republicans have successfully blocked every attempt to do, as an example, denying and shutting down the  investigation into the NSA controversy.

 

I recall several Republicans bitching about that issue as well. Which is not to disagree with what you said, just to point out that, if what we both say is accurate, lots of Congresscritters are acting two-faced as all hell.

 

 

Press has paid little attention to this despite Democratic protests.  This is what happens when you have no check on the Executive Branch. 

 

On the other hand you have to tolerate B.S. investigations like Whitewater and Presidential sex habits.  The only thing Dems can do is invite testimoney of folks with knowledge of to but not participants in the Administration or its ongoing scandals.

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And someone tell me the system works properly.

[Mickey]

I recall several Republicans bitching about that issue as well.  Which is not to disagree with what you said, just to point out that, if what we both say is accurate, lots of Congresscritters are acting two-faced as all hell. 

And someone tell me the system works properly. 

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Yeah, they bitched but that was it, when push came to shove, they were good little senators. Doesn't it make you feel better to know that they were "deeply troubled" and "gravely concerned"?

[YellowLinesandArmadillos]

Yeah, they bitched but that was it, when push came to shove, they were good little senators.  Doesn't it make you feel better to know that they were "deeply troubled" and "gravely concerned"?

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And there is the rub, the GOP can threaten removal of all that pork barrel spending they are doing and while some Dems have been bought off too, enough aren't getting any chear from this group that they wouldn't care about the threats, with two parties with control of the parts there is at least some competition to hold each other accountable.

 

Sometimes they form compromises even with two parties and secret deals get done that corrupt the whole process. But usually that stuff leaks because someone sees it to their advantage and it implodes down the line.

 

Better than one party in control.