Within the last 6 weeks, I was listening to NPR while driving and heard an interview by Terry Gross, I think, maybe the FreshAir program. She was talking with a professor who was writing a book about Middle East politics. He had a daughter who was studying in Europe, who he talked to on the phone on a regular basis. He was relating details of an invasion of his college office by the 'men in black'.
The saga continues below:
Evidently he had traveled to Iran, Iraq, Syria etc. doing research for his book. He also made phone calls to other professors of political science in those countries. He did internet searches on topics relating to our government policies involving Middle East countries. He had pages and pages of manuscripts and reference material in his office.
When the federal agents came to his office with a warrant, their mission was to confiscate and arrest this potential terrorist. They were concerned about this contact named "Caroline" who was perhaps the leader of a European cell.
During the interview, the professor was convinced that the information gathered was under the President's FISA wire-tapping network. He was a respected university professor doing legit research related to the politcal science classes he taught at that university. The over zealous direction of this surveillance by the FBI, CIA, NSA in conjunction with the telecom companies is a clear violation of the 4th Amendment.
Oh, by the way, the professor's daughter is named Caroline.
So how can you help? Did anyone else hear this program? I have done a search on the NPR site and can find nothing about it. Some of you are much better at on-line research than I, and I'd love to read the entire transcript to re-check my reaction to it - which is, this is a clear example of why US citizens should be very concerned about the FISA vote which is about to take place on Capital Hill.
UPDATE - Thanks to the expert help! The interview was by Ira Glas with Lawrence Wright, a journalist for New Yorker Magazine. So, I'm sorry about thinking it was a professor instead of a journalist. But even more important, this was a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author (The Looming Tower) being monitored by our government - equally offensive to us US citizens who respect the Constitution rule of law.