Ever since 9/11 I've been much more interested in examining "why the dog didn't bark" than looking directly at the words and actions of Bushco (see
here for example). In the current scandal, what didn't happen was the obtaining of easily obtained FISA warrents for domestic spying. So why didn't the NAS obtain those warrents?
kos writes in today's "Midday open thread":
Aravosis highlights the key question media should ask when discussing domestic spying: if there's no time to get a warrant, why not use the 72-hour window to get the warrant after the fact? Those warrants are almost never denied.
Bushco is claiming that they didn't have time enough to obtain these warrents. But like most "explainations" from them, that's probably not really the truth.
So I've been thinking of possibilities:
- Too Little Time. Very lame.
- Too Arrogant. Well, we know they are deffinitely an arrogant bunch, but is that really a good reason to break the law?
- Too Busy. What will all the work protectin' America, robbing the poor, enriching the rich, there just just wasn't enough time to deal with a little legal issue like a warrent.
- Too Stupid. We know they really are stupid - but in a greedy and fearful way, not in a way that would lead to blatantly breaking the law.
- Too Many Warrents Needed. IMHO this is the real reason they didn't bother to seek them. Check out C|Net's article Just how extensive is NSA's spy program?. Apparently they are wiretapping everyone - that's 300 million warrent's needed.
If indeed Bushco is electronically listening to EVERY overseas communication, in essense wiretapping EVERYONE, we can begin to understand why they would forego obtaining easily obtained warrents. Asking for 300,000,000 warrents might have rasied a red flag someplace.
So what do you think?
