NY Times reports that spy program is not narrowly targeted

[Perry E. Metzger]

According to President Bush, the illegal NSA domestic espionage
program he ordered was narrowly targeted against people known to have
Al Qaeda links. However, it appears that, as with his previous false
claims that espionage only happened with a warrant, that this claim
was on its face untrue:

   Spy Agency Data After Sept. 11 Led F.B.I. to Dead Ends

   By LOWELL BERGMAN, ERIC LICHTBLAU, SCOTT SHANE and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
   Published: January 17, 2006

   WASHINGTON, Jan. 16 - In the anxious months after the Sept. 11
   attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of
   telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search
   of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of
   agents to check out thousands of tips a month.

   But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to
   dead ends or innocent Americans.

   F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the
   unfiltered information was swamping investigators. The spy agency was
   collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans'
   international communications and conducting computer searches of phone
   and Internet traffic. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also
   thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents,
   were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy.
   [...]
   President Bush has characterized the eavesdropping program as a
   "vital tool" against terrorism; Vice President Dick Cheney has said
   it has saved "thousands of lives."

   But the results of the program look very different to some officials
   charged with tracking terrorism in the United States.
   [...]
   "We'd chase a number, find it's a schoolteacher with no indication
   they've ever been involved in international terrorism - case
   closed," said one former F.B.I. official, who was aware of the
   program and the data it generated for the bureau. "After you get a
   thousand numbers and not one is turning up anything, you get some
   frustration."
   [...]

   Rest of article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/17/politics/17spy.html

I again plead with all of you who care about the future your children
live in to call your congressional representatives and demand that
action be taken. Congress has already largely forgotten about this --
a few weeks is a long time in the memories of politicians. It is up to
you remind them. If you do not, you will have no one to blame but
yourself.

 "All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men do nothing."
                                            -- Edmund Burke

Perry

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