You said it, not me

YOU ARE VISITING THE OLD MALKIN(S)WATCH. THAT'S FANTASTIC. PLEASE VISIT THE NEW MALKIN(S)WATCH WHEN YOU GET A CHANCE.

On the Rasmussen poll:

I'm not much of a poll watcher, but the new Rasmussen numbers on Americans' views of the National Security Agency's counterterrorism programs are very notable:

December 28, 2005--Sixty-four percent (64%) of Americans believe the National Security Agency (NSA) should be allowed to intercept telephone conversations between terrorism suspects in other countries and people living in the United States. A Rasmussen Reports survey found that just 23% disagree.

Yeah, I think you need a little more practice:

Notice anything missing from the question? How about the part that the wiretapping is done without a warrant, although there is a court set up to consider the evidence and issue just such warrants. There is no doubt that the FISA Court would issue a warrant to listen to calls between "terrorism suspects in other countries and people living in the United States." All the government needs is some articulable basis for the suspicion. Apparently that is what it did not have.

If the polling question asked was "do you think that the government should be able to listen secretly to any international phone calls to the United States that it wants to on the approval of a shift supervisor at the National Security Agency without a warrant or any court or legislative supervision whatsoever," the numbers would be very different.

How about "Do you think that the president should be able to violate the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States in the name of security, when in truth there was no real reason to since the FISA court is at his beck and call, and, while we're at it, the fact that Bush found it necessary to end-run FISA in the first place raises serious questions as to whether Bush was surveilling calls between terrorism suspects or, let's say, journalists and congresspeople?"

But that might be a little bit of a leading question. Not to mention a run-on.