Thus, the government takes the position that the metadata collected – a vast amount of which does not contain directly “relevant” information, as the govern

Thus, the government takes the position that the metadata collected – a vast amount of which does not contain directly “relevant” information, as the government concedes – are nevertheless “relevant” because they may allow the NSA, at some unknown time in the future, utilizing its ability to sift through the trove of irrelevant data it has collected up to that point, to identify information that is relevant. Just dripping with hubris! I am just gobsmacked at the audacity of such a claim.