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From owner-cypherpunks@toad.com Sat Jun 4 17:47:37 1994 Date: Sat, 4 Jun 1994 16:43:19 -0700 From: peb@netcom.com (Paul E. Baclace) Message-Id: <199406042343.QAA07231@netcom.com> To: cypherpunks@toad.com Subject: Re: NYT article Sender: owner-cypherpunks@toad.com Precedence: bulk

Does anyone find the following somewhat distorted: "...White House and Justice Department officials have argued forcefully that is a necessary information-age compromise between the constitutional right to privacy and the *traditional* powers of law enforcement officials." [my emphasis] If wiretapping laws were passed in 1968, I don't consider that *traditional*. Is Markoff speaking about surveillance in exceedingly general terms?

Paul E. Baclace peb@netcom.com

Yes, I found it distorted. My question for John Markoff, if he would be kind enough to answer, is: is "traditional" his word, or was it his source's? If source's, was source DoJ, or White House? IMO, police wiretapping usurped a power forbidden to it by the Fourth. To call usurped power "traditional" is pretty smarmy.