[YokoZar]

This would be a reasonable view if there weren't a systematic campaign by the NSA, FBI, and DEA to lie to judges and prosecutors about the actual source of underlying evidence.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intel...

The EFF calls it Intelligence Laundering. The DEA calls it parallel construction. Either way it is sinister and immoral and a court hasn't had a chance to rule on it precisely because it is very difficult for defendants to prove that both the prosecutor and judge were lied to.

[afarrell]

I don't actually hold the view expressed. I've just been trying (and failing) to find a compelling way to articulate the following point: "The FISA court's warrant system is flawed because the validity of its warrants or their execution are never checked because the warrants aren't actually used to bring criminal cases."

So, I thought I'd try sarcasm. But I couldn't come up with a concise way to address the fact that parallel construction means that their info actually is used in criminal cases. Oh well, back to the drafting board...

[pessimizer]

It worked for me. It read like obvious fiction as far as to what I know about the NSA and the last couple of administrations.