> > First, the direct access the NSA DID have was not under the PRISM program.

You did not provide a rebuttal to this. You quoted Greenwald about the PRISM program. I was making the claim that there are bulk data programs that are NOT PRISM.

> > The 'targetted' collection of data itself turned out not to be very 'targetted' at all.

From the NSA review panel:

"In May 2006, however, the FISC adopted a much broader
understanding of the word “relevant.”84 It was that decision that led to the
collection of bulk telephony meta-data under section 215. In that decision,
and in thirty-five decisions since, fifteen different FISC judges have issued
orders under section 215 directing specified United States
telecommunications providers to turn over to the FBI and NSA, “on an

84 See In re Application of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for an Order Requiring the Prod. Of Tangible Things
from [Telecommunications Providers] Relating to [Redacted version], Order No. BR-05 (FISC May 24, 2006). 5
ongoing daily basis,” for a period of approximately 90 days, “all call detail
records or ‘telephony meta-data’ created by [the provider] for
communications (i) between the United States and abroad; or (ii) wholly
within the United States, including local telephone calls.”"

"Almost 90 percent of
the numbers on the alert list did not meet the “reasonable, articulable
suspicion” standard."

"The statutory objection asserts that the FISC’s interpretation of
section 215 does violence to the word “relevant.”"

> > in many cases the NSA was given direct control of the servers that stored the metadata (as with phone records)

> I haven't seen any reporting which said that...

The NSA review panel:

"We recommend that legislation should be enacted that terminates
the storage of bulk telephony meta-data by the government under
section 215, and transitions as soon as reasonably possible to a system in
which such meta-data is held instead either by private providers or by a
private third party. Access to such data should be permitted only with a
section 215 order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that
meets the requirements set forth in Recommendation 1."

"We recommend that, as a general rule, and without senior policy
review, the government should not be permitted to collect and store all
mass, undigested, non-public personal information about individuals to
enable future queries and data-mining for foreign intelligence purposes.
Any program involving government collection or storage of such data
must be narrowly tailored to serve an important government interest."

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/2013-12-1...

The rest of the objections are variations on a theme. If you think I missed something I'll be happy to reply.

Regarding adversarial journalism - journalists and judges are the watchdogs of democracy, as they provide the public with the information and stage that information in ways that the public can respond to. State owned media is a very dangerous thing and America and other countries have passed laws limiting the ownership and direct news bearing to citizens.

However, when certain leverage exists (especially in cases where the public does not pay for news media), and when journalists readily repeat whatever officials and PR spokespersons say as though it were fact, or even set the stage with a apologetic hearing, you end up with Judith Butlers and Ken Dilanians. You end up with uncited apologetic airings of Defense Industry officials on the major news channels (and no contrarian voice).

http://www.democracynow.org/2014/9/15/who_pays_the_pro_war_p...

“It was the best story in my life, and I wasn’t going to let anybody else write it…The whole global war on terror has been classified. If we today had only had information that was officially authorized from the U.S. government, we would know virtually nothing about the war on terror.” - James Risen, top US Military journalist for the NYT, Pulizer Prize winner

We need adversarial journalism just like we needed the mud rackers. And what I've seen of Glenn Greenwald's reporting has shown every sign of due diligence, or it has become clear later how well prepared the issues and articles were collated.

How can I vote without knowing what's going on? I'm a supporter of the United States, through and through. But I need to know what's actually going on to be a politically engaged citizen.

Adversarial journalism is the best way to do that.