"Do you approve or disapprove of the way Bush is handling protecting Americans' privacy rights as the government investigates terrorism?"  51% yes, 47% no
 

How was the question worded?  Suppose it was asked in the following way; “Do you approve of the federal government tracking your every phone call, e-mail, and every keystroke while you are on the phone or on the Internet”?  I wonder if those “approval” numbers would change then?! 

While this is not exactly PC, ask yourself this; “ever come home and have a strange Arabic name on your caller I.D. from someone yopu do not know or answer the phone and it’s a wrong number with a person on the other end with a Middle-Eastern, North African, or South Asian accent?  If the answer is yes, then consider yourself a “suspect”?!  Everyone in the world are separated by no more than six degrees of separation and we are talking about trillions of calls according to CBS.  This is not what the Founders had in mind when they inserted the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution, most especially the Fourth!!!

If you live in Virginia and go to the Verizon web site's "site search" page and search for "privacy", the web site tellingly responds with a "The webpage cannot be found" 404 error page.  Priceless.

I'm switching to a service that will not cooperate with the government on this.  I with Ben Franklin.

Via: Thing Progess and Congress Daily:

NSA Whistleblower To Expose More Unlawful Activity: ‘People…Are Going To Be Shocked’
CongressDaily reports that former NSA staffer Russell Tice will testify to the Senate Armed Services Committee next week that not only do employees at the agency believe the activities they are being asked to perform are unlawful, but that what has been disclosed so far is only the tip of the iceberg. Tice will tell Congress that former NSA head Gen. Michael Hayden, Bush’s nominee to be the next CIA director, oversaw more illegal activity that has yet to be disclosed:

A former intelligence officer for the National Security Agency said Thursday he plans to tell Senate staffers next week that unlawful activity occurred at the agency under the supervision of Gen. Michael Hayden beyond what has been publicly reported, while hinting that it might have involved the illegal use of space-based satellites and systems to spy on U.S. citizens. …

[Tice] said he plans to tell the committee staffers the NSA conducted illegal and unconstitutional surveillance of U.S. citizens while he was there with the knowledge of Hayden. … “I think the people I talk to next week are going to be shocked when I tell them what I have to tell them. It’s pretty hard to believe,” Tice said. “I hope that they’ll clean up the abuses and have some oversight into these programs, which doesn’t exist right now.” …

Tice said his information is different from the Terrorist Surveillance Program that Bush acknowledged in December and from news accounts this week that the NSA has been secretly collecting phone call records of millions of Americans. “It’s an angle that you haven’t heard about yet,” he said. … He would not discuss with a reporter the details of his allegations, saying doing so would compromise classified information and put him at risk of going to jail. He said he “will not confirm or deny” if his allegations involve the illegal use of space systems and satellites.

Tice has a history for blowing the whistle on serious misconduct. He was one of the sources that revealed the administration’s warrantless domestic spying program to the New York Times.

The Washington Post became a much more reliable part of the Republican/Bush spin machine by improperly implying U.S. citizens want to give up freedom.  This development is very serious, and it strikes a blow against the already tattered reputation of the press.  The Post improperly endorsed Bush by setting up a straw man argument in a recent poll that suggest Bush's illegal activities are benign and in our interest. 

Yesterday's Washington Post contained an article, "Poll: Most Americans Support NSA's Efforts," that was very misleading.  The Post used the fear-inducing term "terrorism" twice in a polling question.  Yet the polling question did not mention that Bush's activity violates the law and our Constitution.  The polling question was not phrased to ask about collection of everyone's telephone records without a mandatory search warrant.  The only logical conclusion is that by framing the issue around terrorism and Bush's growing 24/7 dictatorial powers, the Washington Post has become part of the White House fear mongering machine.

Here's the link to the Post article:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/12/AR2006051200375.html

Here's the loaded and misleading straw man polling question asked by the Post:

"45. It's been reported that the National Security Agency has been collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans. It then analyzes calling patterns in an effort to identify possible terrorism suspects, without listening to or recording the conversations. Would you consider this an acceptable or unacceptable way for the federal government to investigate terrorism? Do you feel that way strongly or somewhat?"

The Post should have asked:

"45. The National Security Agency illegally collects a list of all the phone calls you make, and then NSA matches your phone records with the phone records of nearly all other American citizens.  The NSA also illegally records phone calls between American citizens.  Both of these programs collect information without probable cause and without a search warrant issued by a judge, in clear violation of existing law and our Constitution.  The NSA refuses to testify before Congress about how it obtains or uses your phone records.  Therefore, there is no oversight of this enormous domestic spying operation.  Laws were enacted several years ago to prevent this type of abuse during the Republican Nixon Administration, and Nixon was forced to resign in large part due to the Watergate scandal.  Do you support or oppose Republican President George W. Bush's illegal domestic spying on ordinary American citizens like you?"

Once informed about the magnitude and illegality of Bush's anti-democratic efforts, a reasonable person would estimate that only Bush's hard-core supporters, about 20 percent of our population that watches FOX News and drinks GOP Kool Aid, would support Bush's criminal domestic spy operations.

Sibling Rivalry: 'Wash Post' and 'Newsweek' Polls Clash on NSA

By E&P Staff

Published: May 13, 2006 1:15 PM ET

They may be owned by the same company, but two polls commissioned by The Washington Post and Newsweek magazine on the important issue of public approval of the National Security Agency's gathering of phone records produced quite different results.

The Newsweek poll released today found that 53% of Americans believe that reports that the NSA has been secretly collecting the phone records of U.S. citizens goes too far in invading people's privacy. Some 41% feel it is a necessary tool to combat terrorism.

But on Friday, a widely-publicized Washington Post/ABC survey revealed, to the contrary, that 63% of Americans said they found the NSA program to be an acceptable way to investigate terrorism, including 44% who strongly endorsed the effort. Only 35% said the program was unacceptable.

So what happened? Most likely views changed that much in one day after more negative media reports (including many from conservative commentators such as MSNBC's Joe Scarborough) surfaced. The Washington Post survey took place before many Americans had heard about, or thought about, the implications. The Newsweek Poll also reached twice as many Americans.

The Washington Post/ABC survey was conducted Thursday, just after the NSA news broke via USA Today, and reached just 502 citizens. Newsweek polled 1007 Americans on both Thursday and Friday. It found that even 27% of Republicans voiced disapproval of the phone records program.

The Newsweek results were pretty stark: 57% of Americans say the administration has gone too far in expanding presidential power, while only 38% say they have not. The president's job approval rating in this poll declined one point to 35%.

Paul is correct in terming the POST poll a push poll, in the best Karl Rove tradition. While it is unlikely the POST would have worded the key question quite as carefully (and wordily) as Paul recommended, it is obvious that the way they did word it was prejudicial in the extreme. I wonder not only where they got the questions, but WHY they decided to run  such a poll so hastily? I heard various pundits interviewed on WTOP the day the story broke. They stumbled around like a high schooler dragged in front of the principal, not knowing just what to say but obviously anxious not to offend Bush. 

If ever the fix is in, it's now.