"Let me ask why every smart blogger out there and every pundit on TV is talking about wiretapping when the obvious problem is that the U.S. government is now monitoring the entire U.S. Internet a la Echelon or Raptor.

Why do Gonzales and Condi Rice keep mentioning the "technical" aspects of the program as a dodge around FISA?

Why this seemingly inconsequential parsing by Bush of the difference between "monitoring and detection"? Bush says they use FISA if they're monitoring, but this is about "detection."

Why, in his letter, does Rockefeller state that he's "not a technician."?
Why the mention of TIA in Rockefeller's letter?
And why the mention of "large batches of numbers all at once"?

Why?

These are not phone numbers we're talking about...These are IP addresses, email addresses.

A system is in place that basically filters on certain triggers (text, phoneme, etc.) within Internet "conversations." This is "detection" or at least it's tortured definition that was placed in this idiot Bush's mind. "Monitoring" would be recording an entire conversation, like in a phone conversation.

That system then collects information on those conversations including...ta da...source and destination IP addresses. Those IP addresses can then be stored for further investigation on other "conversations."

E.g., I start an email thread with a friend in France. I mention Al Qaeda. My conversation is "detected" and my info is stored. The system then segments my address into another system and starts a deeper "detection" on any further "conversations" for further triggers. Hence, the system could still be said to be in the detecting mode, not monitoring. If I don't mention any other "evil" words, if I simply send medical records or lusty love letters or diatribes against liberals, I'll eventually be dropped."

"The NSA activities were justified by a classified Justice Department legal opinion authored by John C. Yoo, a former deputy in the Office of Legal Counsel who argued that congressional approval of the war on al Qaeda gave broad authority to the president, according to the Times."

In an appearance on Fox & Friends Monday morning, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez said, "We believe that the president has the inherent authority as commander in chief under the Constitution to engage in signals intelligence of our enemy, against al Qaeda, but we also believe the president has statutory authority."

On Sunday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told NBC's "Meet the Press" that the president has "authorities" under Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act -- "which we are using, and using actively. He also has constitutional authorities that derive from his role as commander in chief and his need to protect the country. He has acted within his constitutional authority and within statutory authority."

On Monday morning, Gonzales noted that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act "does require a court order before we can engage in electronic surveillance...except as provided otherwise by statute. And we believe that Congress has 'provided otherwise by statute' in the authorization of the use of force, which Congress passed in the days following the attacks of Sept. 11."

"We've had discussions with members of Congress, certain members of Congress, about whether or not we could get an amendment to FISA, and we were advised that that was not likely to be -- that was not something we could likely get, certainly not without jeopardizing the existence of the program, and therefore, killing the program. And that -- and so a decision was made that because we felt that the authorities were there, that we should continue moving forward with this program."

"Gonzales says it was okay to spy on Americans without authorization because the war resolution gave them that power. But when asked why they didn't ask for specific congressional authorization, he says, well, Congress wouldn't have given them that power."

"It's been reviewed not just by the White House counsel but by the lawyers of the Justice Department and by the lawyers of the NSA, the National Security Agency, and by the Inspector General of the National Security Agency, and it has to be reauthorized every 45 days. And the Congress, the congressional leaders, including...including leaders of the relevant oversight intelligence committees have been briefed on this."

"There was no reference made to the fact that we were going to...begin unwarranted, illegal - and I think unconstitutional - eavesdropping on American citizens."

"The President asserted in his December 17th radio address that "leaders in Congress have been briefed more than a dozen times on this authorization and the activities conducted under it." This statement gives the American public a very misleading impression that the President fully consulted with Congress.

"First, it is quite likely that 96 Senators of 100 Senators, including 13 of 15 on the Senate Intelligence Committee first learned about this program in the New York Times, not from any Administration briefing."

“We all agree that the President must have the best possible intelligence to protect the American people, but that intelligence must be produced in a manner consistent with the United States Constitution and our laws. The President's statement today raises serious questions as to what the activities were and whether the activities were lawful.

I was advised of President Bush's decision to provide authority to the National Security Agency to conduct unspecified activities shortly after he made it and have been provided with updates on several occasions.

The Bush Administration considered these briefings to be notification, not a request for approval. As is my practice whenever I am notified about intelligence activities, I expressed my strong concerns during these briefings."

"I think the President broke the law....It's not enough for the President to get his lawyers to tell him what he wants to hear. That's not the kind of objective legal advice that the Constitution requires for this kind of action to be undertaken."

"I don't consider this a close case at all...This operation was based on a federal crime."

"If he has the authority to go around the FISA court, which is a court to accommodate the law of the war of terror, the FISA Act was - created a court set up by the chief justice of the United States to allow a rapid response to requests for surveillance activity in the war on terror. I don't know of any legal basis to go around that. There may be some, but I'm not aware of it. And here's the concern I have. We can't become an outcome-based democracy. Even in a time of war, you have to follow the process, because that's what a democracy is all about: a process."

"My interpretation of the law would be yes, that he did not have the legal authority to do this under the Afghanistan war resolution or under the general powers as commander-in-chief. The Congress in 1978 - and there's been no effort to modify it in any significant way since that time - understood that circumstances might change, but it did not provide for any circumstance in which the president alone, without consulting any other legal authority, judicial authority, could waive the rights of U.S. citizens to be free from having their phones wiretapped."

"Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis) responded to Gonzales' comments in an NBC interview this morning. "This is just an outrageous power grab," he said. "Nobody, nobody, thought when we passed a resolution to invade Afghanistan and to fight the war on terror, including myself who voted for it, thought that this was an authorization to allow a wiretapping against the law of the United States. "There's two ways you can do this kind of wiretapping under our law. One is through the criminal code, Title III; the other is through the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. That's it. That's the only way you can do it. You can't make up a law and deriving it from the Afghanistan resolution. "The president has, I think, made up a law that we never passed," said Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.)"