Wrong People Asking The Right Questions

So, where were we? Oh, that's right... The Bush administration has been running roughshod over the Rights of the American people by conducting secret surveillance programs on American's communications without court order. To make matters worse, American telephone companies have either been complicit in aiding the administration, or were forced to help. Either way, they are both guilty of violating our Rights.

 

Fed up with what appears to be a blossoming soft dictatorship, the American people have called upon their representatives in Congress to put an end to this rampant surveillance state. To that end, the House Energy and Commerce Committee has begun inquiries into what roles the telecommunications companies played in spying on Americans without warrants. And, on cue:

Three of the largest U.S. telephone companies declined to answer lawmakers' questions about Bush administration efforts to spy on Americans' phone calls and e-mails, saying the government forbade them from doing so.
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Verizon and Qwest said the Justice Department prohibited them from offering any substantive comment on their roles in the spy program. AT&T said Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell invoked the state-secrets privilege to prevent the carrier from commenting.

But that's not exactly right. You see, the telephone companies can talk, they just need to be asked by the right "people" in government. Those that are asking the questions of them right now are with the House Energy and Commerce Committee. They don't have the proper authority to receive the answers to the questions they're asking. Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell's spokesman, Ross Feinstein, said the House and Senate Intelligence committees have the authority to oversee intelligence activities under the 1947 National Security Act.

 

It's a smokescreen. Our representatives can look like they're doing something about government run amok, but when they run into the inevitable brick wall, they can say to the American people, "We asked, but they refused to tell us. What more can we do? We can't make them talk." They knew from the outset that they had no authority to get answers to these types of questions from the phone companies. The whole thing is a circus to placate the people... and it's working.