I can see your point. Also, I can agree that things in our government have not been perfect; after all, they are only human. Hopefully the new program will do something to help our national security. I have faith our leaders will not let something go so far as warrant-less searching on all fronts. Something like that would have to go through the Congress, Senate, and the media before reaching the President.

Jon

P.S. – We may never know who the NSA is tapping in on, but I guess if we don’t know, then neither do the terrorists who are making the calls.

You’re right, some of the terrorists have been living on our own land. That part of my post was a bit extreme, but it was intended to highlight the (in my opinion) futility of much of the claims of the FISA amendment.

On the other hand, how can we know that they are only wiretapping calls between the US and other nations? Between the Patriot Act and the new FISA legislation, there is no oversight of this wiretapping. Prior to FISA/Patriot Act/etc., there was still a process in place to obtain warrants to perform wiretaps. There were options for the government to obtain the intelligence needed.

As far as the NSA is concerned, I don’t really think they’re the reputable organization we’d like them to be. For example, I’m not sure how wiretapping delegations to the United Nations (including our allies) qualifies as a benefit to National Security[1]. Let’s also not forget that the NSA was alongside the CIA in providing ‘intelligence’ that the Bush administration claimed indicated that Iraq was in possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction[2].

1. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/mar/02/usa.iraq
2. http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/library/congress/2004_rpt/iraq-wmd-intell_chapter8.htm

I’m not saying Intelligence-gathering is bad, but I am saying that we continue to put ourselves on a very slippery slope that looks like it will end with no warrants being needed for any searches.

I have to disagree with you. The wiretapping is certainly a good thing, as it makes our country safer. I understand that there is a lot of disagreement over the bill, but keep in mind that the calls being tapped are only those that are going between the US and other nations, ones that have been identified as possible terrorist calls.

Also, your comment of fear of 3rd worlders living in caves: Have you forgotten?

Remember 9/11? We were attacked by those cave-dwellers on our own land. In my mind, anything to make our country safer is a good thing, as long as it is within the borders of common sense. Tapping phone calls from suspected terrorists makes sense because the sooner we can catch their plans, there is a lesser chance that hundreds of innocent people (like on 9/11) will die. So what if we hit a few innocent calls along the way. It’s better to be safe than sorry. Besides, the NSA has the intelligence information to make good decisions on what phone calls to tap, so the chance of tapping innocent phone calls are limited.

I like your blog and I don’t want to start a debate, but that’s just my 2 cents.

Jon