Obama Calls Surveillance Programs Legal and Limited
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/08/us/national-security-agency-surveillance.html?ref=global-home&_r=0
WASHINGTON
— President Obama on Friday offered a robust defense of the government
surveillance programs revealed this week, and sought to reassure the public
that his administration has not become a Big Brother with eyes and ears
throughout the world of online communications.
“Nobody is listening to your telephone calls,” Mr. Obama
said, delivering a 14-minute answer to two questions about the surveillance
programs at an event that was initially supposed to be devoted to the health
care law. “That’s not what this program is about.”
Editorial
President Obama’s Dragnet
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Published: June 6, 2013
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/opinion/president-obamas-dragnet.html?pagewanted=all&src=ISMR_AP_LO_MST_FB
Within hours of the disclosure that federal authorities
routinely collect data on phone calls Americans make, regardless of whether
they have any bearing on a counterterrorism investigation, the Obama
administration issued the same platitude it has offered every time President
Obama has been caught overreaching in the use of his powers: Terrorists are a
real menace and you should just trust us to deal with them because we have
internal mechanisms (that we are not going to tell you about) to make sure we
do not violate your rights.
Those reassurances have never been persuasive — whether on
secret warrants to scoop up a news agency’s phone records or secret orders to
kill an American suspected of terrorism — especially coming from a president
who once promised transparency and accountability.