This is what the secrecy is all about ...

Back in October of 2011, the then-Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich wrote a letter to Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.) concerning section 215 of the USA Patriot Act.

As NPR's Dina Temple-Raston reported earlier today, the senators had expressed concern about a "secret interpretation of the Patriot Act that would stun the American people."

In the letter, obtained by NPR's Carrie Johnson, Weich explains in broad terms how the government collects information using section 215 of the Patriot Act, which expanded the powers of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. And he makes two main points: Congress had detailed knowledge of the classified uses of section 215 and despite that reauthorized the statute and two other provisions of the Patriot Act by overwhelming margins in May 2011.

"Against this backdrop, we do not believe the Executive Branch is operating pursuant to 'secret law' or 'secret opinions of the Department of Justice,'" Weich writes. "Rather, the Intelligence Community is conducting court-authorized intelligence activities pursuant to a public statute, with the knowledge and oversight of Congress and the Intelligence Committees of both Houses. There is also extensive oversight by the Executive Branch, including the Department of Justice and relevant agency General Counsels and Inspectors General, as well as annual and semi-annual reports to Congress as required by law."

Udall said the lack of transparency, not the breadth in information collected, is what concerns him the most.

“That’s why I’ve been fighting for years to amend the Patriot Act,” Udall said.“My concerns are that people need to know how the president interprets his authority under the Patriot Act … He said he was going to submit to transparency in the State of the Union … I expect him to uphold his commitment.”

[O]ur court system is set up to be an antagonistic one, with both sides represented before a judge. The government has managed to avoid such antagonistic scrutiny of its data collection and mining programs — even in the al-Haramain case, where the charity had proof they had been the target of illegal, unwarranted surveillance — by ensuring no one could ever get standing to challenge the program in court. Most recently in Clapper v. Amnesty, SCOTUS held that the plaintiffs were just speculating when they argued they had changed their habits out of the assumption that they had been wiretapped.

This order might just provide someone standing. Any of Verizon’s business customers can now prove that their call data is, as we speak, being collected and turned over to the NSA. (Though I expect lots of bogus language about the difference between “collection” and “analysis.”)

That is what all the secrecy has been about. Undercutting separation of powers to ensure that the constitutionality of this program can never be challenged by American citizens.

“The program Senators Feinstein and Chambliss publicly referred to today is one that I have been concerned about for years. I am barred by Senate rules from commenting on some of the details at this time. However, I believe that when law-abiding Americans call their friends, who they call, when they call, and where they call from is private information. Collecting this data about every single phone call that every American makes every day would be a massive invasion of Americans’ privacy.

The administration has an obligation to give a substantive and timely response to the American people and I hope this story will force a real debate about the government’s domestic surveillance authorities. The American people have a right to know whether their government thinks that the sweeping, dragnet surveillance that has been alleged in this story is allowed under the law and whether it is actually being conducted. Furthermore, they have a right to know whether the program that has been described is actually of value in preventing attacks. Based on several years of oversight, I believe that its value and effectiveness remain unclear.”

“We are very much under threat," [Lindsay]Graham said on "Fox & Friends ... Radical Islam is on the rise throughout the region. Homegrown terrorism is one of my biggest concerns. It is happening in our own backyard, and I am glad that NSA is trying to find out what terrorists are up to overseas and inside the country."