Via Powerline.

From Bloomberg News:

One of the lawmakers who was briefed on the surveillance program, Senator Jay Rockefeller, the senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, yesterday released a copy of a July 17, 2003, handwritten letter to Vice President Richard Cheney, expressing ``concerns'' after he was first briefed about the program that day. ``Clearly, the activities we discussed raise profound oversight issues,'' Rockefeller, a West Virginia lawmaker, wrote in the letter. ``I simply cannot satisfy lingering concerns raised by the briefing we received.''

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From the Washington Times:

If Mr. Rockefeller had these concerns, Mr. Roberts (Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence- Senator Pat Roberts) said, he could have raised them with him or other members of Congress who had been briefed on the program. "I have no recollection of Senator Rockefeller objecting to the program at the many briefings he and I attended together," Mr. Roberts said. "In fact, it is my recollection that on many occasions Senator Rockefeller expressed to the vice president his vocal support for the program," most recently, "two weeks ago."

Jay Rockefeller was right in the first place - this is just not that important an issue that everyone has to go around screaming like Chicken Little. It the new practices did indeed represent a whiff of fascism from the White House, he should have done more than scribble a vague CYA memo to Cheney and then present it two and a half years later as some kind of proof that he's a great fighter for civil liberties.