>That is, the phone records, without any wiretaps or other access to
>content, can provide immense amounts of information. And without the
>trouble of listening to endless hours of chit-chat on wiretap tapes.
But you can't act on that information without a court order that kicks things up to the next level. And this kind of stuff hampers real investigation, which boils down to old-fashioned police work. That's why Spain is better at finding and arresting people like the subway bombers than we are.