If this happened under George Bush, you would be outraged. Be outraged by Barack Obama too!

[stevenleser]

75. Not 'now', I have been saying it would be incrementally better for six years.

Why is a blank warrant better than the NSA being able to decide on their own who to wiretap with no paper trail and no ability to know who they wiretapped 1 year, 3 years, 10 years down the road? Do you really need me to lay that out there for you? OK.

1. With FISA, a judge actually has to look at and sign off on the request for the "search". Sure, in practice most requests are granted. That judge still has to put their name to the acceptance.

2. With FISA, congressional committees from both the House and Senate have the ability to gain access to the warrants and look them over to see if they make sense and are supported. That provides congressional oversight to what the Executive branch (via DOJ request for the warrant) and Judicial Branch (sign off on the warrant) has done. Now you have three branches of government involved in oversight of what with warrantless wiretapping was just one agency of one branch.

3. Because of 1 and 2, anyone attempting to wiretap or gain access to records or perfom any kind of a search for frivolous reasons has to fear that they will be held accountable for that request.

So no, it is not a step toward authoritarian rule, it is a step away from it. The entire reason we have separation of powers and elected officials in both the executive and legislative branches of the government is to provide the people, through their elected representatives, access to the actions of their government. It's the exact opposite of a step toward authoritarianism.