Or at least that’s what they’re saying at this point. They claimed that they weren’t wiretapping American citizens, or collecting information on calls made within the United States, but — whoops — they were. I expect that we don’t yet know the full extent of this program, and that further investigation will reveal that it’s broader and deeper than is now known.

CoRev, not that arguing with you is going to make a damn bit of difference, but “Whose rights?” — well, YOUR rights, idiot, and mine, and everyone else whose bank records have been trawled through on some snipe hunt for terrorists.

This is another one of those “vast database” programs where the personal information of ordinary Americans was collected as a matter of course and justified by counterterrorism. Yet this kind of database is simply too much information — the CIA already has too much data to process and translate. It’s a waste of resources to maintain this kind of database unless your purpose is something other than fighting terror.

There are provisions in the law for obtaining warrants for this stuff, but the Bush people think they’re above the law. Time and time again.