Skewered By Statistics?

The Administration and the NSA say they were just looking at phone numbers, not content. How do you get from numbers to terrorists? Why, statistics; maybe. The convoluted answer they have given so far is "a terrorist makes a call to the U.S., then the resulting links, phone calls, are then followed to others friendly to the terrorists. Oh?
Why then are millions of phone numbers being processed? There can't be that many terrorists to be able to make phone calls to and inside the U.S.
My guess is it is about statistics. Number crunching. Patterns, based on statistics, are recognized by some formula; and individuals tagged by this pattern are then scrutinized. The court is then used to get a warrant to monitor his/her phone calls. That is unreasonable search because they weren't doing anything--just being a phone call statistical anomaly. Legal technically, maybe, but when you analyze what they are really doing you will see they are using statistics to "side-step" the law. You can't use statistics to "finger" people by. It is still an unreasonable search.
As far as their remonstrating that our rights are being protected--not a chance. This crowd has a "means justifies the ends" philosophy; so anything goes in their quest for security.
Read your history books--the Germans did the same back in the 1930's and see what it got them. They traded economic security for a Dictatorship.
There is no easy path to security; certainly not one that gives up our freedoms. When Politicians start asking the public to trust them--watch out!