Democracy Has Prevailed.

January 18, 2007

More on Domestic Surveillance/FISA

Yesterday, I posted this about dubya's plan to hand over oversight of his domestic surveillance program to the FISA court.

On the surface, it looked like good news, but there were some that were skeptical.

Turns out there might be reason to be. Check this out from the NYTimes.

The administration said it had briefed the full House and Senate Intelligence Committees in closed sessions on its decision.

But Representative Heather A. Wilson, Republican of New Mexico, who serves on the Intelligence committee, disputed that, and some Congressional aides said staff members were briefed Friday without lawmakers present.

Ms. Wilson, who has scrutinized the program for the last year, said she believed the new approach relied on a blanket, “programmatic” approval of the president’s surveillance program, rather than approval of individual warrants.

Administration officials “have convinced a single judge in a secret session, in a nonadversarial session, to issue a court order to cover the president’s terrorism surveillance program,” Ms. Wilson said in a telephone interview. She said Congress needed to investigate further to determine how the program is run.

Which lead Josh Marshall over at talkingpointsmemo to ask:
Is it all a sleight of hand?
With this administration, I wouldn't put it past them.

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