Barack Obama, Meet George Orwell

On May 23, President Barack Obama gave a major speech on terrorism that was intended to signal the end of an era. In his remarks at the National Defense University, Obama said the terrorist threat against the U.S. had “shifted and evolved” since the Sept. 11 attacks. It was time, he said, to ask “hard questions” about how the U.S. should adapt to new realities.

Curiously, we now learn that just one month before his speech, the Obama administration responded to new realities with the same old habits. On April 25, administration officials sought court permission under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to begin collecting telephone records of millions of U.S. customers of Verizon Business Network Services, a Verizon Communications Inc. subsidiary. A compliant national security court -- there appears to have been no other type since Sept. 11 -- authorized the collection, allowing it to continue until July 19. The order isn’t scheduled to be declassified until 2038.