> We've had two independent reports (the Presidential Review Group's[1] and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board's[2]) since then detailing exactly what is being done with phone records and what the NSA is allowed to do with them.

And in those documents it was confirmed that the NSA was in charge of maintaining a database with all phone records of all Americans and that the limitations on the storage of these records are five years - that limitations on querying them are enforced only at a policy level.

The issue is not about whether there has been abuse. The issue is about the fundamental principles of freedom in our country against suspicion-less search and seizure. An infringement on this is and of itself is an abuse.

It's like saying: "Yeah they have slaves, but there's no evidence that they mistreat them." You're not engaging with the substance of the argument. Unless it is that you depart from the founding principles of freedom established to protect the United States of America, its citizens, and to promote well-being and liberty for all? Do you disagree with these principles, so long as those who govern don't abuse the power so far as the public knows?

> Why is the beginning and end of that paragraph important but not the fact that NSA analysts are required to destroy any US person communications that couldn't be automatically filtered out and contain no intelligence value or evidence of a crime?

First, it seems you agree with the parent? You don't dispute him, just add an addendum about minimization. In response to your addendum: it's clear that the collection is made and then by policy alone it is 'minimized'. The issue is that the collection is done in the first place without a person being suspected of a crime. Their content can be collected, then it can be decided if they are suspect of a crime or not, and then it may possibly be released. This is principally different than how law enforcement is supposed to work in the United States.

Another thing we learned from the Obama Administration oversight panel is that anything within three hops of a target is considered relevant for collection (and the hops are counted across Facebook, Twitter, AIM, Snapchat, LinkedIn, Gmail, phone, geolocation, etc). But we also know that on Twitter alone the average number of hops between any two people has been measured to be 3.43 [1]; and on Facebook it is 4.74 [2]. When every one of these networks is combined, it is almost assuredly close to if not below 3.0, and the number of targets is quite large. Because of this every person's contents are 'relevant to the an authorized purpose of acquisition' because all persons are likely to be within three hops of a request.

> You go to quote Jameel Jaffer at the ACLU as saying that...

I would agree that details are missed in his summary (this is the nature of summaries) but I would also classify his statement as accurate (not misleading). The NSA will collect client-attorney communications. If and when it is recognized as 'protected communication' the NSA will stop but keep the communications it has collected. It can disseminate them (there are processes for it, but it can). Protecting the communications from review and use in criminal prosecution while preserving the intelligence almost reads like... parallel construction...

[1] http://www.aaai.org/ocs/index.php/SOCS/SOCS11/paper/view/403...

[2] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/8906693/Faceb...