Interesting

From the Consumerist regarding data mining:

'I was having a discussion with my boss when the NSA stories first started coming out. He’s a more experienced data miner who came onto this project from a Homeland Security thing, and he's got clearance, so he's been around a bit. He reminded me that when the US was training the Afghan people to fight the Soviets, they did something very stupid - they not only taught them how to fight a land war, but they gave them a translated copy of the CIA counter-intelligence manual. Some asshole essentially gave Al-Qaeda the CIA playbook.

Ergo, Al Qaeda knows better than to use the phone or email to communicate.

It follows that there is NO VALID REASON for the NSA to gather phone data - no terrorism is going to be fought with it, unless you count (cue that scene from 'Fahrenheit 9/11') people who go to peace activist groups and sit around munching on homemade cookies. The only reason for them to gather data is the one you fear - that they just want to spy on their own citizens.'