[mrsmith]

It's the Judge, Hogan, who was at fault.
The offices can certainly be searched if there is reason to think evidence of crimes is hidden in them, but he treated the privilege merely as other privileges have been treated.

Now he's got to fix his mistake and it's going to take a lot of work by him to do that.

[muawiyah]

It's also the fault of the FBI agents who came up with this ridiculous raid. They apparantly were unable to properly articulate their concerns else the Speaker would have authorized the search (under appropriate controls, and the watchful eye of armed Capitol Hill police).

It's time for the FBI to give up their affirmative action garbage and start hiring people who actually can read, write and analyze ~ not just people who can sound tough. After all, some of them are little different than the sort of folks you'd find in the secret police in any tinpot dictatorship.

So, two things to do ~ clean up the FBI, and put watchdogs on judges as they write warrants for them.