NSA - RADIO TIDBITS

(Hat-tip to Atrios)

USA Today has a report on the massive NSA program to collect the calling records of 10s of millions of Americans. Qwest Communications was the one major telecom that refused to go along with this invasion of privacy:

Among the big telecommunications companies, only Qwest has refused to help the NSA, the sources said. According to multiple sources, Qwest declined to participate because it was uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants.

The NSA told Qwest that other government agencies, including the FBI, CIA and DEA, also might have access to the database, the sources said. As a matter of practice, the NSA regularly shares its information — known as "product" in intelligence circles — with other intelligence groups.

Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused.

The NSA's explanation did little to satisfy Qwest's lawyers. "They told (Qwest) they didn't want to do that because FISA might not agree with them," one person recalled. For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest's suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general's office. A second person confirmed this version of event


So, the NSA was afraid that the FISA court would reject their collection program AND it was unwilling to even try to get the then-Attorney General Ashcroft to sign off on it. Clearly, the NSA, headed by Gen. "What 4th Amendment?" Hayden, strongly suspected that the program was illegal.

Now, what did gasbags Slots and War Whore Ingraham have to say?

Slots, as usual, was all for the program and completely unconcerned about the obvious 4th Amendment issues. He had the audacity to claim that he was devoted to the rule of law despite in the past openly urging that President Fredo ignore the Supreme Court if it ruled against the NSA domestic spying program.


War Whore was also aghast that there could be any objection to this program after 9-11. She also made the claim that "no Republican of good standing" could be opposed to it and criticized Sen. Lindsay Graham for merely questioning the program.

Neither Slots nor War Whore mentioned anything about Qwest's dealings with the NSA. The conclusion is obvious: neither Slots nor War Whore care about any limitations on the power of the Fredo's government.