That line is from Pink Floyd, "The Wall". I think about the song when the talk show pundits, spinmasters, and liars "discuss" the Able Danger situation.
We are going to discuss the 3 letter goverment agencies: NSA, CIA, and FBI.
The NSA is the evesdropping agency of the the United States. Because of prior abuses by this agency, the NSA is bound by law to only do its spying on entities outside of the geographic boundaries of the U.S. Entities are people and American owned businesses. Additionally, anyone legally in the U.S. is considered to be, for the sake of spying, a U.S. citizen.
The CIA is a "spying" organization of the U.S. It is allowed to conduct espionage activities in the defense of the United States.
The FBI is a law enforcement organization of the U.S. It is allowed to "spy" on U.S. citizens for the purposes of gathering information to be used in the prosecution of individuals believed to have committed crimes.
What does this have to do with "The Wall"?
Everything!
Let's use this story that appeared in the UK Times Online as the discussion point.
According to Colonel Shaffer, a small, highly secret intelligence unit known as Able Danger had used data-sorting techniques to identify Atta and his accomplices as possible US-based terrorists by mid-2000, but military lawyers prevented the team from sharing their information.
Colonel Shaffer said that lawyers working for the Special Operations Command of the Defence Department, cancelled the meetings because they believed that the surveillance techniques used by Able Danger could be understood as a violation of the rights of people who were living legally in the US.
That's all you really need to read. The information about the terrorist group was collected on people who legally reside in the U.S. If there was concern about breaking The LAW, how can this be blamed on the Clinton administration and the so-called "Wall" that the "Clinton administration put in place"?
The fact is, the "Wall" is a set of laws enacted before Clinton was in office. It is NOT a set of regulations or guidelines put in place by each administration.
Background information of the 3 agencies listed and more.