So if you look around the news today you'll see lots of stories about people that are angry with Obama because he flip-flopped and voted for FISA which allows the US government to do surveillance without individual warrants, something that up till now has been illegal and companies that helped (ie the phone/internet companies) would be fined. Now they are no longer fined.

What do you think about it?

The US government has probably been doing it alll along. The only difference is that now people know about it.

Ditto to what Nicole said.

Obama has no stances on anything... this doesn't surprise me at all.

He goes wherever the political wind blows, and is a walking, talking, gaffe machine. Just today he talked about the "bomb that fell on Pearl Harbor"... he was born in Hawaii, where Pearl Harbor is situated, and he doesn't even know basic American history related to it.

As for FISA itself, I love this analysis by a blogger named Zombie about the Bush Administration vs. Al-Haramain case that kicked this debate off:

"Both sides were put into completely impossible positions: The government had to suppress a document which revealed Top Secret surveillance without actually admitting that it had conducted any surveillance; whereas Al-Haramain sought to revoke its designation as a terrorist organization by citing the very evidence (the information gathered during the surveillance) that suggested it was a terrorist organization. " -- Zombie (this was in 2007)

I gotta say...it looks like Obama is trying to move towards the centre and I dont like it one bit.

The political centre wont bring about the change Americans so badly want from the Bush years. American politics need to have a much larger shift towards the left if they want to make any significant progress.

Right now neither McCain nor Obama are making any significant gains in the polls, and I think its because no one knows exactly where they each stand. Obama has confused his message by trying to move towards the centre after the primaries were over, and McCain seems to not be able to provide any form of coherent message on any issue.

Dont get me wrong, Im still an Obama guy. I think Obama genuinly knows what right...right now hes just getting sucked into the pandering, vote-grabbing politics he is so against. I sincerly hope he backs away from the pandering and speaks about what he actually belives in...only then will he actually be able to win by any significant margin.

Does the government have to meet certain requirements (ie: they have to have a very good reason to do this) before being able to conduct the surveillance or is it up to some random persons descretion?