Latest Administration Doublespeak on Surveillance

In an article from the Washington Post today, the director of National Intelligence was quoted today saying that less than 100 people in the United States were actually being targeted for secret- court-approved wiretaps aimed at disrupting terrorist networks. And that is exactly what they would like the citizens of the United States to believe.

The problem here is that it is not the ones that the Administration seeks warrants that are concerning – it is the many more citizens that are being monitored where warrants are not sought out. Also, the program is not focusing solely on one terrorist abroad speaking with another terrorist in the United States; the act is not limiting the monitoring to only those whom the government think are engaging in terrorist actions – it is a far wider spectrum than that. And finally, the new FISA amendment that President Bush has recently signed into law allows the government to intercept any and all calls or e-mail correspondence as long as the government has reason to believe that the party is overseas. What the government is doing here, and its disingenuous and misleading explanations, should worry every American citizen, and ought to be the subject of serious congressional oversight.