All of Bush's and Gonzales's arguments I've heard about the program have ignored FISA. If he had gone to the FISA court, we wouldn't have heard about the program and there wouldn't be such an uproar about it.

It does seem as if they feel that if any call crosses the border then the NSA should be able to listen in without restriction. Sorry, George, but that's not what the law says. No, FISA isn't going to give you a blank check, either.

Another thing that this reminds me of is: Bush and the administration told us that there were 60,000 al Qaeda-types around the world and that they were in most countries around the world. They also keep telling us that they're breaking up plots and the "Terrorist Surveillance Program" is making a difference, it's critical to success, etc., etc. If so, why aren't we hearing about hundreds or thousands of people being arrested and tried and being "Brought to Justice"? Have there been more than a dozen trials in western countries that have any direct links at all to al Qaeda since September 2001?

Where's the beef?

Don't get me wrong. There are undoubtedly many people out there who are plotting to do damage to the US and have the means to do so. We need to go after such people. I just wonder whether this group numbers in the hundreds rather than the 10s of thousands. My accounting, in this case, separates the jihadists who want to go battle in Iraq or Chechnya or Bosnia from those who want to attack US political or economic interests - something that the present administration obviously doesn't want to do...

:-/

Bush might say: "We can't put them on trial because we're gaining too much intelligence from them. Critical intelligence!"

Me: Hmmm.

It's just something else that's been bothering me lately... FWIW.

Cheers,
Scott.