The operable quote, both yesterday and today, in regard to how widespread or in what way the NSA domestic phone number tracking program is being used is as follows:
"President Bush said Thursday the government is "not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans" with a reported program to create a massive database of U.S. phone calls."
http://www.cnn.com/...
In his radio address today, Bush said pretty much the exact same thing:
"The privacy of all Americans is fiercely protected in all our activities. The government does not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval. We are not trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans. Our efforts are focused on links to al Qaeda terrorists and its affiliates who want to harm the American people."
http://www.whitehouse.gov/...
The key phrase, in my mind, is "millions of innocent Americans". Could it be "
hundreds of thousands of innocent Americans? How about "millions of Americans
who may or may not be innocent in our minds"?
Mark my words, you heard it here first, that phrase will be parsed later on to say that yes, mining and trolling of innocent Americans took place aplenty, but not in the millions, so it wasn't technically a lie. Either that, or it depends on what the meaning of "innocent" is. We saw the exact same thing in regard to the Plame leak, when that first broke.
The phrase "want to harm the American people" is equally open to equivocation. Who gets to define who is harming or wants to harm the American people? We all know that most right wing pundits believe everyone on this site, in fact everyone to the left of Jerry Falwell "hates America".
I haven't heard Bush specify exactly what measures are used to ensure such "fierce protection" - hopefully someone will ask Tony Snow about that next week.
I realize this is no big revelation, in and of itself, just another reminder to pay close attention to the exact wording that's being used, and how it preserves their own deniability later.