NSA warrantless wiretapping unconstitional

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(IsrAmeriPrius @ Aug 21 2006, 08:32 PM) [snapback]307310[/snapback]</div>

Very interesting, indeed! It mentions 179 modified orders out of 5,645 requests, which works out to .03 % if I'm doing the math right, and "at least six" outright denials. That doesn't seem to be that much of a barrier to me, so I think they should have continued using the FISA court for the new NSA program. The article does mention that all the modifications and denials have come in the most recent two years, so the Bush Administration may have thought there was a trend they couldn't afford to allow to continue. But the right thing to do would be to go to Congress and have the parameters of the FISA court changed to allow us to use the same techniques we used during the cold war by establishing some kind of de-facto standard of probable cause that says something like "if you're calling a known terrorist, we can listen in", or some other kind of legislative authority to conduct the evesdropping. Perhaps that would have tipped off our terrorist enemies, but there's always the chance of a deterrent effect too.

Instead, the Bush Administration used "hot war" empowerment as a justification. Time will tell if that holds up as appropriate; I hope not. I don't think the global war on terror is the same as a "hot war" in terms of Executive power or privilege (nor is the "war on drugs" or the "war on the organized crime" which both use the more draconian RICO measures). I think we SHOULD expand surveillance, because listening in on a phone call is so much less destructive than dropping bombs on a neighborhood, but can have just as good a result in terms of stopping terrorism. But I think it can certainly be done within law with the legislative branch involved.