BushCo Authorizes Eavesdropping on Americans

The Times came out with a late story yesterday indicating that Bush lifted some limits on spying in U.S. after 9/11.

Under a presidential order signed in 2002, the intelligence agency has monitored the international telephone calls and international e-mail messages of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people inside the United States without warrants over the past three years in an effort to track possible "dirty numbers" linked to Al Qaeda, the officials said. The agency, they said, still seeks warrants to monitor entirely domestic communications.

The previously undisclosed decision to permit some eavesdropping inside the country without court approval represents a major shift in American intelligence-gathering practices, particularly for the National Security Agency, whose mission is to spy on communications abroad. As a result, some officials familiar with the continuing operation have questioned whether the surveillance has stretched, if not crossed, constitutional limits on legal searches.

See, what gets me here is that the Administration doesn't really care about civil liberties. Security against terrorism is a grim truth today. The cost is what the NSA does with this information that is useless and whether they are targeting the "right" people and not anti-war activists, left-leaning organizations, etc. And, besides, "we are fighting them over there, so we don't have to fight them here..." What are agencies that focus solely on foreign lands doing spying domestically? Preventative maintenance? This sounds like an exercise in absolute power. And, we know there is no internal oversight, which tells us that the checks and balances system is not working.

Interestingly enough, The Times plays into the covertness of the story with involvement...

The White House asked The New York Times not to publish this article, arguing that it could jeopardize continuing investigations and alert would-be terrorists that they might be under scrutiny. After meeting with senior administration officials to hear their concerns, the newspaper delayed publication for a year to conduct additional reporting. Some information that administration officials argued could be useful to terrorists has been omitted.

Was this a polite nod given the recent hubbub over Miller and the TreasonGate affair or journalistic integrity due the political landscape the Times has been trudging through as of late? It begs to question what the arrangement was, but I am reaching here. Besides, the legality of what power BushCo holds is the issue. The Times article goes on, noting the White House intentions...

The eavesdropping program grew out of concerns after the Sept. 11 attacks that the nation's intelligence agencies were not poised to deal effectively with the new threat of Al Qaeda and that they were handcuffed by legal and bureaucratic restrictions better suited to peacetime than war, according to officials. In response, President Bush significantly eased limits on American intelligence and law enforcement agencies and the military.

But Americans, civil libertarians and watchdogs know what is a perceived threat and what it not. The slide in BushCo polls indicate that Americans see through the GOP rhetoric and realize that the administration gets away with a lot more than it should. According to the Times, some government officials have similar reservations:

Some officials familiar with it say they consider warrantless eavesdropping inside the United States to be unlawful and possibly unconstitutional, amounting to an improper search. One government official involved in the operation said he privately complained to a Congressional official about his doubts about the legality of the program. But nothing came of his inquiry. "People just looked the other way because they didn't want to know what was going on," he said.

A senior government official recalled that he was taken aback when he first learned of the operation. "My first reaction was, ?We're doing what?' " he said. While he said he eventually felt that adequate safeguards were put in place, he added that questions about the program's legitimacy were understandable.

Adequate. That is what we have come down to - mediocrity in intelligence - whether it is safeguards or gathering. It is important to consider that America's mission is to hold itself to a higher standard. Free peoples have the level of expectation that Big Brother is not watching them. Intelligence agencies concentrate on looking at the big fish, not the local citizen wanting to give a donation to a Palestinian children's fund.

Several senior government officials say that when the special operation first began, there were few controls on it and little formal oversight outside the N.S.A. The agency can choose its eavesdropping targets and does not have to seek approval from Justice Department or other Bush administration officials. Some agency officials wanted nothing to do with the program, apparently fearful of participating in an illegal operation, a former senior Bush administration official said. Before the 2004 election, the official said, some N.S.A. personnel worried that the program might come under scrutiny by Congressional or criminal investigators if Senator John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, was elected president.

This is rich, this one. Spies are so elated that BushCo is in charge, because they can do anything they want, freedom be damned... I would read on.