Byron Dorgan: “let me say, I don't think anybody in the Congress, the Senate, or the House wishes our intelligence community to be…”

“let me say, I don't think anybody in the Congress, the Senate, or the House wishes our intelligence community to be blind or deaf. Obviously, we have a process in this country with the FISA Court that allows emergency actions. The opportunity to be able to engage in surveillance and the appropriate surveillance to make sure we are listening to terrorists and all of those things are available. There is a debate about how wide should the drift net be, that the administration might want to gather almost every communication everywhere in the world and data mine to find out who is saying what. That is an important conversation because it deals with the basic rights in our Constitution. I think there is no one in this Chamber or in the other who believes we want our intelligence community to be blind or deaf and to not have the opportunity to do the kind of surveillance necessary to protect our country. That is very important to state.”