Revealed: the top secret rules that allow NSA to use US data without a warrant

[Catherina]

101. Lol! Cute. There's a concerted effort, from on high down, to play this down

and instead focus on Snowden's *treason* and there's a lot of apathy, just like in PreNazi Germany. People think it won't affect them because they don't think they have anything to hide.

Here's how the coverage here is going.

We get a choice between this:

(Video report) ... One such warrant seen by the Guardian shows that they do not contain detailed legal rulings or explanation. Instead, the one-paragraph order, signed by a FISA court judge in 2010, declares that the procedures submitted by the attorney general on behalf of the NSA are consistent with US law and the fourth amendment. (end clip)

GWEN IFILL, NEWSHOUR: Thank you, Glenn. Now for analysis is Rep. Elmer Fudd, chairman of the House Un-Intelligence Activities Committee. Congressman Fudd?

FUDD: Thank you, Gwen. The surveillance was approved by an act of Congress in 2009 and has had judicial review, so it's perfectly legal. And it has stopped terrorist attacks, lots and lots of them.

GWEN: How do you know?

FUDD: Because Congress, or at least my Committee, or at least me and a few others, have been regularly briefed.

GWEN: When? How often?

FUDD: I can't really say. We're sworn to secrecy. I'd like to keep my first-born child, if I could. But the FISA court did sign off on it

GWEN: They seem to have rubber-stamped it.

FUDD: Can't get more efficient than that, yes sirree.

GWEN: And now, it's pledge week, when PBS turns our programming over to local stations so they can keep programs like this on the air.

http://discussion.guardian.co.uk/comment-permalink/24480665

and this


http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023053750