In favor of Wiretaps - circa 2000

A bit of history from the Clinton administration. The Chairman at Maggie's Farm points us to this article at The American Thinker:

Under Clinton, NY Times called surveillance "a necessity"
The controversy following revelations that U.S. intelligence agencies have monitored suspected terrorist related communications since 9/11 reflects a severe case of selective amnesia by the New York Times and other media opponents of President Bush. They certainly didn�t show the same outrage when a much more invasive and indiscriminate domestic surveillance program came to light during the Clinton administration in the 1990�s. At that time, the Times called the surveillance �a necessity.�

�If you made a phone call today or sent an e-mail to a friend, there�s a good chance what you said or wrote was captured and screened by the country�s largest intelligence agency.� (Steve Kroft, CBS� 60 Minutes)

Those words were aired on February 27, 2000 to describe the National Security Agency and an electronic surveillance program called Echelon whose mission, according to Kroft,

�is to eavesdrop on enemies of the state: foreign countries, terrorist groups and drug cartels. But in the process, Echelon�s computers capture virtually every electronic conversation around the world.�

Echelon was, or is (its existence has been under-reported in the American media), an electronic eavesdropping program conducted by the United States and a few select allies such as the United Kingdom.

Tellingly, the existence of the program was confirmed not by the New York Times or the Washington Post or by any other American media outlet � these were the Clinton years, after all, and the American media generally treats Democrat administrations far more gently than Republican administrations � but by an Australian government official in a statement made to an Australian television news show.

Lots more to read at The American Thinker. Curious how something could be so bad for one administration but so good for another...