[bcx]

If I recall the original FISA warrants were part of the US Patriot Act, which was one of the greatest increases in domestic surveillance in US history and brought about as an immediate response to 9/11.

I haven't followed what it's been up to over the last 12 years, but it's nice there was actually some expiry in there. Certainly the US intelligence apparatus existed pre 9/11. Would FISA courts and secret warrants have prevented 9/11, who knows. Did all the agencies get a rubber stamp in everything they ever wanted in response to 9/11 under the guide of patriotism, during a period of intense groupthink -- likely.

[kmeisthax]

>Would FISA courts and secret warrants have prevented 9/11, who knows.

We already could have prevented 9/11 with the intelligence that we had at the time. Al-Qaeda was already known to be targeting US assets since the USS Cole bombing, every branch of the intelligence agency was already trying to spy on al-Qaeda[0], and the FBI specifically were already aware of the hijackers[1]. We even had multiple warnings from foreign governments about al-Qaeda[2].

The problem was a matter of correlating all that intelligence into some kind of actionable intervention. All the things I mentioned needed to be put together into a comprehensive list of people to arrest and where to find the evidence necessary to keep them behind bars for a decade. Anything less renders the whole effort futile - if you miss some hijackers, the attacks still happen; if you fail to make the charges stick, then the attacks happen later. More SIGINT doesn't always help: if anything, it means more information overload and more potentially missed threats.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Tenet#Al-Qaeda_and_the_...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijackers_in_the_September_11_...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks_advance-k...

[kelnos]

I'm pretty sure most of the PATRIOT Act (including the FISA stuff) has come up for expiration many times since 9/11, and Congress more or less just rubber-stamps a renewal of all of it, with at best minor changes/reforms.

I think this bill that the FBI is opposed to is the first real reform we're seeing that actually takes away some power from these agencies.

[heroprotagonist]

Do these kind of things ever actually expire though?

All the 'temporary' powers granted with an expiration period have been renewed or expanded for the last 30 years. Often as little-noted riders on lesser bills of questionable relation, or bundled as side notes into major debacles like threats of government shutdown.

[newZWhoDis]

Federal income tax was supposed to be temporary for WWII, we see how that worked out.

[rsync]

Federal income tax, while extant in some ways prior, was broadly established in 1913 with the 16th amendment[1].

Other than very high war profiteering tax rates imposed during WWII - which were not only refundable but also removed over time - there is almost no connection at all between WWII and the broad concept of federal income tax.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixteenth_Amendment_to_the_Uni...

[gosub100]

> Certainly the US intelligence apparatus existed pre 9/11

yeah, the CIA was busy welcoming terrorists into the country [1], one of whom would get convicted of planning the 1993 WTC bombing:

"he tried to re-enter the U.S. in August 1991. At that point, U.S. officials recognized that he was on the lookout list, and began the procedure to revoke his permanent resident status. The U.S. government still allowed him to enter the country, as he had the right to appeal the decision to revoke his residency status. Abdel-Rahman failed to appeal the decision, and on 6 March 1992, the U.S. government revoked his green card. He then requested political asylum. A hearing on that matter was held on 20 January 1993.[14] It was later revealed that Abdel-Rahman was given most of his visa approvals by the CIA.[15] Egyptian officials have testified that the CIA was actively assisting him in entering the US.[16][17] The CIA also protected Abdel-Rahman after he arrived in the United States.[18]"

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Abdel-Rahman