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Comment by timtas | Hacker News Reader

> The new amici...will not represent specific clients.

Let's be clear. These are friends of the court, not any kind of advocates. They work for the court. They are not adversaries to the executive.

What, for example, will happen if the court systematically ignores them? Can they go to the media? What can they do but resign? That will make the nightly news and be forgotten by morning.

This creature is called a "court," but, lacking adversarial advocates it's wholly an instrument of the executive branch. Adding some friends with impressive resumes does not change that.

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It's fuzzy which branch FISC belongs to.

It's staffed with Article III federal judges who are appointed by the Chief Justice, which makes its construction about as far from the executive branch as you can get.

It oversees the NSA and CIA, which are controlled by the executive branch, and has no authority to hear cases. It hears only matters regarding foreign intelligence, which puts its subjects outside the protection of the Constitution, which protections are most of the point of Article III courts. It is in that sense so difference from Article III courts as to make it a little unclear whether it is one.

And it was created by Congress, as a way of delegating rulemaking about surveillance that was properly owed by Congress --- the FISA process was a way for the 1970s Congress to punt on the issue. Unlike other courts, Congress can abolish FISA tomorrow and replace it with a set of rules. It is in that sense entirely a creature of Congress.

The FISC is weird, is what I'm saying.

Interesting background. Thanks. Here's my question. Exactly who outside of the court itself knows what it does? That is, what entities are privy to it's docket, rulings and the details of it's proceedings?

I believe the answer is "no one." If I am correct, it is an abandonment of the thing that makes America the greatest country in the world: It's endless appeals system.

Not quite no one. Certainly applicants themselves are privy to the details of cases they themselves bring. I guess applicants are always agencies of the executive branch.

Is that where it stops? I wonder, do FBI agents discuss details of it's FISC cases with, for instance, NSA agents? And can the FBI, for instance, obtain details of a FISC case brought by, for instance, the NSA?

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