🚀 go-pugleaf

Brad Yearwood offers some explanations for why only 1 in 900 requests
for a wiretap warrant were declined. I've got a few more to add:

4. Administrative rules and procedures that require a lot of probable
cause before such a warrant is even considered by a judge.

5. Rigorous internal review by the Justice Department before such a
request goes forward. (See a lot of recent TV material in which a
scrupulous D.A. restrains his over-eager subordinates, so that
his adminstration isn't embarassed or even admonished by judges.)

6. Administrative rules which permit application for a wiretap
in only the most serious cases of espionage and criminality.
(Given the number of crooks in this country, I'm amazed that
only 900 warrants were requested-it seems to me to be prima
facie evidence of extreme restraint and/or heavy procedural
controls by the government. If we consider espionage and counter-
espionage cases alone, that's a lot fewer than the number of
foreign intelligence agents we may speculate are active in this
country.)