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The word "collecting" means something different in NSA vocabulary than it does in our vocabulary: to them, it is defined as "specifically looking at". Gather/store and collect are completely different things, to them...

It allows for them to make such statements to people who don't know their definition, and later claim they did not lie.

I really don't understand why they're allowed to redefine terms like this.

Shouldn't the media be calling them out?

Yes. they should. now think real hard about why that might not be happening here.

Even the use of the phrase "phone things" could be an attempt at being unspecific-enough to avoid lying. What are "phone things"? They're nothing ... or they're whatever we later describe them to be when confronted with conflicting information. On one of the most critical areas of disclosure - and the statement on it is meaningless.

He's telling the truth. His phone is the one untapped phone in the country. His emails are the ones that are not being collected. Therefore, not everyone's phones are being tapped and not everyone's emails are being collected. Q.E.D.