A cowardly federal judge appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush threw out a lawsuit aimed at blocking AT&T from giving telephone records to the government for use in the so-called war on terror, citing national security.

"The court is persuaded that requiring AT&T to confirm or deny whether it has disclosed large quantities of telephone records to the federal government could give adversaries of this country valuable insight into the government's intelligence activities," U.S. District Judge Matthew F. Kennelly said in his ruling.

The lawsuit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois on behalf of author Studs Terkel and other activists who said their constitutional rights were violated because of a National Security Agency program of gathering phone company records on American citizens.

Bush Justice Department attorneys argued it would violate the law against divulging state secrets for AT&T to say whether it had provided telephone records to the supersecret spy agency, while the ACLU argued that the practice was no longer secret, since numerous news reports made it clear phone records were given to the agency.

But the judge, covering his ass and not knowing what the fuck he is talking about, said the news reports amounted to speculation and in no way constituted official confirmation that phone records had been turned over. He also ruled that Terkel and the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which sought class-action status, had not shown that their own records had been provided to the government, so they lacked standing to sue the government.

AP: Judge Dismisses Phone Records Lawsuit

Well in that case, we've got a source with an iron clad case - if only there were a kick-ass liberal lawfirm in these parts willing to pursue the case and risk the full wrath of Karl Rove and the Bush Republican smear machine.