President Run Amok and His Jolly Old Spooks

Here’s another example of Bush, Hayden, et al. talking out their behinds about the NSA spying program. This from today’s NYT:

A surveillance program approved by President Bush to conduct eavesdropping without warrants has captured what are purely domestic communications in some cases, despite a requirement by the White House that one end of the intercepted conversations take place on foreign soil, officials say…

Telecommunications experts say the issue points up troubling logistical questions about the program. At a time when communications networks are increasingly globalized, it is sometimes difficult even for the N.S.A. to determine whether someone is inside or outside the United States when making a cellphone call or sending an e-mail message.

At his last news conference, Pres. Run Amok made a point of emphasizing the NSA is NOT targeting calls that are wholly domestic in origin/destination. In these quotations, various Administration officials flog the point ad nauseum:

Gen. Michael V. Hayden was asked at a White House briefing this week whether there had been any “purely domestic” intercepts under the program.

“The authorization given to N.S.A. by the president requires that one end of these communications has to be outside the United States,” General Hayden answered. “I can assure you, by the physics of the intercept, by how we actually conduct our activities, that one end of these communications are always outside the United States.”

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales also emphasized that the order only applied to international communications. “People are running around saying that the United States is somehow spying on American citizens calling their neighbors,” he said. “Very, very important to understand that one party to the communication has to be outside the United States.”

Gotta watch these fellows. They’ll strip you naked in a second if you turn your backs on ’em.