Because the subtext of the article is that Roberts himself is an intractable obstacle to reforming FISC, when in fact all the responsibility for doing so is properly on Congress, at whose pleasure Roberts serves in his capacity as FISC judge appointer. The article is inadvertently letting Congress off the hook.

What part of the article suggests that Roberts is an obstacle to reform? The article only states that in its current formulation, FISC does not have a lot of accountability because the judges are all chosen by Roberts with no input from any other part of government.

The only branch of government that doesn't have influence over FISC is the executive, which runs NSA.

I don't think that is the most reasonable interpretation. I think the article argues that we do need reform, because in its current state, the system does exhibit the properties described.

It's not letting congress off the hook, it's painting a bullseye and applying pressure for them to pull the trigger. Until they do so, John Roberts has exclusive, unaccountable, lifetime power to shape the surveillance state.

While I too prefer code that compiles with -pedantic, I'm willing to forgive this author, and I don't see anything to suggest that the author believes that he is an intractable obstacle. I even think it's extraordinarily unlikely that any journalist sincerely believes that any single person is a permanently intractable obstacle in the government, so it makes the most sense to assume that was not the motivation.

As long as you say that understanding what FISC actually is, compared to a bona fide Article III court, I'm happy to agree to disagree. Incidentally: I like Ezra Klein a lot; Ezra Klein, Felix Salmon, and Matthew Yglesias are my daily reads.

> The article is inadvertently letting Congress off the hook.

Perhaps Klein could have briefly reminded readers that the "A" in "FISA" stands for "Act" -- that is, of Congress -- but this is a blog post in the Washington Post. I can't fault Klein too much for overlooking that not all readers might share that bit of context.