The Bush Administration has been hell-bent to eliminate personal privacy in the US. Some of that is to benefit insurance companies, and is understandable. What's less understandable is why they want more information for the "war against terror".

In the first place, the Administration had more than enough information to prevent 9-11. They knew bin Laden was going to strike in the US (again), they knew he wanted to use at least one airplane, they had FBI agents telling them that foreigners were learning to to fly large airplanes, not take-off or land. Despite the NSA saying "who would have thought they'd fly airplanes into buildings", a lot of people had pointed out that was a possibility. (She said the information didn't rise to the level of their attention. One wonders what had risen to that level.)

So, they didn't need any more information.

And second, they said they had too much information to process. That was without additional spying.

The only thing which makes sense to me is that it's used for political purposes. Certainly the Bush Administration does not have the moral restraint to avoid doing that.

Arf