Himes, Blumenthal weigh in on Obama’s NSA speech

Two Connecticut lawmakers closely involved in intelligence matters _ Sen. Richard Blumenthal and U.S. Rep. Jim Himes _ had mixed reactions to President Obama’s Friday speech on the NSA and its telephone metadata gathering.

Himes, who serves on the House intelligence committee, praised Obama for creating a privacy advocate to be a public representative in FISA court hearings, and for requiring a warrant for any query of telephone metadata.

But he said he does not believe the President’s plan goes far enough _ and unlike others  on the intelligence committee, he does not support the continued bulk gathering of the telephone-call information.

“I am fundamentally uncomfortable with a massive warehouse of data on every American,” Himes said. “It’s just too personal a collection of data. You can basically reconstruct a person’s life from that data. … With five years of my phone calls, you can see my professional, social, religious and physical life. That’s not what we are about” as a country.

Blumenthal , who introduced a bill last August to create a privacy advocate for the FISA court, which decides on intelligence agencies’ requests for surveillance warrants and other actions, said he wa “enormously encouraged” that Obama decided to take that step.

“I anticipated he would adopt my proposal when I talked with him. He had given me a chance to make my case” in  private discussions, Blumenthal said.

But Blumenthal also believes the President and Congress need to go further to rein in intelligence-gathering activities.

Obama “was strong on principle, less so on prescription,” Blumenthal said, observing that Obama had left the specifics of further action up to Congress. But he added that he was “inspired … by the President’s willingness to listen.”

Himes said that in his intelligence role, “I’ve seen zero evidence” that the metadata program has been abused, but added that the NSA could “honestly point to only two or three instances where the program contributed” to a successful outcome, “much less made an essential difference.”

“In Washington you hear the constant refrain that if you want to find a needle in a haystack, you have to have the haystack,” he said, “but it’s theoretically more useful than it has been in practice.”

He added that he “was not a buyer” of the theory that the phone companies themselves could keep the bulk metadata. “Phone companies don’t have inspector generals,” he said.

“It’s our job to keep the tools of government limited to tools that couldn’t be abused by a more abusive regime than we have today,” Himes added.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal is "enormously encouraged" by Obama's creation of a FISA privacy advocate. (AP)

Sen. Richard Blumenthal is “enormously encouraged” by Obama’s creation of a FISA privacy advocate. (AP)

Jim Himes said he is "uncomfortable with a massive warehouse of data on every American." (Hearst file photo)

Jim Himes said he is “uncomfortable with a massive warehouse of data on every American.” (Hearst file photo)

David McCumber, Washington Bureau Chief