[Sam Hill]

"FYI, Lamberth didn't stop those taps."

According to the article:

"the FBI was forced to shut down wiretaps of Qaeda-related suspects connected to the 1998 African embassy bombing investigation.

“It was a major problem,” said one source familiar with the case, who estimated that 10 to 20 Qaeda wiretaps had to be shut down, as well as wiretaps into a separate New York investigation of Hamas."

Do you have some information to the contrary?

[jess35]

The Justice Department went to the FISA court and admitted giving misleading, incomplete and erroneous information on 75 wiretaps. What should Lamberth have done? Said, Don't worry folks, It happens all the time. Well just give you a wink and a nudge if you promise to follow the law in the next 75 cases?

Once the Patriot Act was signed, the standards for wiretaps was changed but that did not occur in 2000. The Clinton administration was trying to do an end run around their own rules....for instance, the Gorelick wall which prevented the FBI from information sharing.

I'm not going to blame the court (in this instance) for ignoring existing law and holding the government to their own standards. For as much complaining as we do about judicial activism on this forum, sometimes it seems we're a-ok with it as long as it involves something we support.