From: John Cuccia 

So W is caught telling an outright lie.

I wonder how his supporters (however few they may be) will spin this one?


On Thu, 11 May 2006 10:12:48 -0400, "Rich Gauszka"
 wrote:

>So much for the 'only' international calls bullshit spouted by the Bushies.
>Now it will probably be 'it's not really monitoring, we're just doing
>analysis'
>
>
>"Adam"  wrote in message
>news:44633d8e{at}w3.nls.net...
>> why do you need a constitution at all?
>>
>> http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.htm
>>
>> "The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting
the phone call
>> records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T,
>> Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement
>> told USA TODAY.
>>
>> The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by
>> amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom
>> aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA
>> listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the
>> data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist
>> activity, sources said in separate interviews.
>>
>> "It's the largest database ever assembled in the world,"
said one person,
>> who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities,
>> declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's
goal is "to
>> create a database of every call ever made" within the nation's borders,
>> this person added.
>>
>> For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has
>> detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country —
>> to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.
>>
>> The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the
>> NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11
>> terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying
>> and tracking suspected terrorists, they said.
>>
>> The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA
>> program is secret.
>>
>> Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to
>> become the director of the CIA, headed the NSA from March 1999 to April
>> 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic
>> call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program.
>>
>> The NSA's domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive
>> than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had
>> authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international
>> calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to
>> terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants
>> have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call
>> database.
>>
>> In defending the previously disclosed program, Bush insisted that the NSA
>> was focused exclusively on international calls. "In other
words," Bush
>> explained, "one end of the communication must be outside the United
>> States."
>>
>> As a result, domestic call records — those of calls that originate and
>> terminate within U.S. borders — were believed to be private.
>>
>> Sources, however, say that is not the case. With access to records of
>> billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a secret window into the
>> communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street
>> addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part
>> of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA
>> collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that
>> information."
>>
>>
>> Chuckle. One hopes that record includes politician's phone calls so
>> domestic intel orgs such as the NSA can adhere to their main task which is
>> keeping elected pols "on the right road".
>>
>> Adam
>

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