According to a report by USA Today, officials with several major telecommunications firms (including: AT&T, BellSouth, Verizon and Qwest) have confirmed that these firms have cooperated extensively with the National Security Agency in amassing a huge database of phone calls made by US citizens.

According to sources, the program amounts to a massive call log identifying who was called and when. Though there is no assertion that any calls were recorded or monitored, the mere fact that the federal government is chronicling our telephone conversations is a huge affront to our Constitutional rights…or do we have any Constitution rights in this day and age?

Has the US Constitution been secretly shredded at the National Archives without our knowledge or are the guarantees it espouses merely suggestions, which the government can disregard at its leisure? If the president remains silent on this practice or does not reject it outright, then there can be no doubt that George Bush is no friend to the founding ideals of this nation. A nation that can achieve so many great things should not have to resort to such treachery in order to protect us from evil doers, indeed if this nation must resort to tyranny to protect our rights, it can be argued that our rights have already been lost…

Even more egregious is the fact that these private firms are complicit in such treachery, each and every customer of these firms should be compensated for this unlawful, unconstitutional, unwarranted and unjustified invasion of privacy.

Previously the president acknowledged that the NSA was solely concerned with international calls, a questionable program in its own right, now it appears this was a deception. When questioned about the NSA database, the White House decided to play it coy, noting that “there is no domestic surveillance without court approval.” Technically that is correct, however, amassing a huge database of the calling habits of ordinary Americans is no less a blatant violation of the 4th amendment. What nerve these people have….
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-10-nsa_x.htm