No Chance that the DNI Will Be Arrested, I Bet

Weeks before the National Security Agency (NSA) began a massive phone sweeping operation on U.S. cellular provider Verizon, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Congress the agency does not conduct intelligence on American citizens.

Testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Clapper denied allegations by panel members the NSA conducted electronic surveillance of Americans on U.S. soil.

"Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" committee member Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) asked Clapper during the March 12 hearing.

In response, Clapper replied quickly: "No, sir."

Of course, we all know now that that statement was a complete lie. The NSA is collecting telephone data on everyone. The man flat-out lied to Congress. The DOJ went after Roger Clemens for lying to Congress, but as to the chances of Clapper being so charged-- my cat stand a better chance of winning a MacArthur Genius Grant.

The NSA, of course, wants to arrest the the guy who blew the whistle on their spying on everyone.

Oh, and CBS News? Bullshit on saying that Clapper "rebutted" anything. DNI released something that CBS called a "fact sheet" that touts the judicial oversight of the FISA* court. What little has been leaked out from the FISA process would seem to support the notion that the FISA court is a glorified rubber stamp, existing only to put a constitutional gloss on things. Nobody gets to litigate any of this, of course. Because the NSA won't confirm anything, nobody can prove that the NSA is spying on them, so the Supremes have turned their backs, closed their eyes, put their fingers in their ears and are humming loudly.
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* The first word in "FISA" is "foreign", an inconvenient fact that doesn't seem to stand in the NSA's way of collecting phone data on everyone in this nation.