Aaron raises an interesting question. Personally, I’m skeptical that this or any other administration could be that clever, or that the NYT, which sat on the story for a long time before publishing it, would have cooperated, or that such an ornate plan would make sense. I also think there’s plenty of evidence that the NSA has been doing this kind of mass-monitoring of communications for decades, which makes me think that they are still doing it. But who knows.