“On December 16, 2005, the lead article in the New York Times, by James Risen and Eric Lichtblau, was titled ‘Bush Lets U.S. Spy on Callers Without Courts.’ The article instantly became a national sensation, revealing the broad outlines of a secret eavesdropping program run by the NSA [National Security Agency] to find al Qaeda operatives, but not many of the specifics. The most explosive aspect of the article was the revelation that for four years NSA had monitored the communications of Americans without obtaining warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), which are ordinarily required in order to conduct any form of surveillance inside the United States.”
– Matthew M. Aid, The Secret Sentry, Page 287