Brit Hume with the latest bit of water carrying for the NSA on this week's Fox News Sunday. Never mind that there have been abuses by the agency, Hume wants the audience to believe that if they're sucking up everyone's information, there's nothing to worry about.
HUME: And that's the correct answer to the question. The correct answer to the question, in my view, is what improprieties?
This program really threatens no one unless it's abused. And to date, not a single victim has been identified. Not a single abuse of the metadata has been identified that harmed anyone in any way.
So that's, I think, the real reason why Congress hasn't done anything is that the program has so far worked as intended, although it hasn't done as much as they might have thought it could. But there's no one harmed.
WALLACE: But, Brit, you know, you got the e-mails. You're going to get them today.
HUME: I'm sure I'm going to get them today.
WALLACE: I get the e-mails. And there are a lot of very loyal patriotic Americans who are outraged by this, outraged by what they've learned of Edward Snowden. And as far as they're concerned, well, maybe you can't point to the abuse, but the idea can just vacuum up all of this information about law-abiding citizens, they're very offended by it.
HUME: They're offended by the concept of it and that's understandable. What many of them don't understand is these telephone calls are not being listened in on. It is simply a record of the kind that your phone company gets every time you place a call of the number you called, the duration of the call, the time of the call. That's it.
And when you have that -- when you see the number of phone calls made and the volume of this metadata, this is the ultimate haystack. And, you know, if you have special procedures have to be undergone to search this vast amount of information.
My basic thesis, I guess is, everyone is supposedly under surveillance, everyone with every call, then no one is.
WILLIAMS: But you know what? I think a lot of people, Brit, the Tea Party folks and the libertarians. So, that's Rand Paul to Bernie Sanders.
HUME: And the UCLA.
WILLIAMS: Yes. Their fear is unlike you and me. I think you and I agree on this because we both assume they're listening to whatever is going on and they should be.
HUME: I don't think (ph) that they're listening to anything.
WILLIAMS: I think they do. I think they collect everything.
(CROSSTALK)
HUME: So, you think they're listening to your phone calls?
WILLIAMS: I think they have the capacity to --
HUME: That's a different matter.
No it's not Brit.
