Too funny... I made very nearly this same suggestion to a co-worker last week (in jest though). My spin was that the NSA should both fund themselves, and justify their existence, by offering valuable services, like the "Is my spouse cheating on me" report, and a "background checks on potential co-founders" service, etc. As well as, of course, providing archived copies of lost email, files, etc.

The thing is, I really was just joking. But somewhere out there, there's probably somebody who thinks this is all actually a good idea.