Top Aide Defends Domestic Spying

[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Eric Lichtblau & James Risen]
President Bush decided against allowing the National Security Agency to intercept purely domestic phone calls and e-mail messages after the Sept. 11 attacks in part because officials realized such a decision would provoke intense opposition if made public, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales testified Monday. President Bush was intent on striking "the right balance" between national security and privacy interests, Mr. Gonzales said at the start of Congressional hearings into the N.S.A. program. Noting the criticism the program has drawn since its disclosure in December, Mr. Gonzales said, "the reaction would have been twice as great" if Mr. Bush had expanded it to eavesdrop on communications wholly inside the country. Under the surveillance program, the N.S.A. has been eavesdropping without warrants on the telephone calls and e-mail messages between people inside the United States and people overseas.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/07/politics/07nsa.html
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* Gonzales Defends NSA Eavesdropping
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113923612162366033.html?mod=todays_us_page_one