NSA: secret "sources and methods"

* here's a line of reasoning that im seeing become conventional wisdom re snoopgate:

"Given Congress's pliability, several commentators have wondered why the White House did not ask Congress to amend FISA to allow the sort of warrantless data mining and eavesdropping that has set off the current flap. A White House official who declined to be identified discussing internal deliberations says that the administration feared a congressional debate would have tipped off the terrorists to secret "sources and methods" used by the NSA and other spy services." (link)

but this is categoric nonsense. Negroponte's Total Information Awareness was widely discussed in the media through to July 2003 - and that included all of the things that we are talking about in snoopgate:

"the (TIA's) stated mission to gather as much information as possible about everyone, in a centralized location, for easy perusal by the United States government, including (though not limited to) Internet activity, credit card purchase histories, airline ticket purchases, car rentals, medical records, educational transcripts, driver's licenses, utility bills, tax returns, and any other available data. "

therefore the 'secret sauce' justification for keeping the program secret because it would "tip off the terrorists to secret "sources and methods"" is complete rubbish. it's conceivable that it was perhaps true in the days after 911, but once the TIA story came out, that argument is no longer valid.