When Judge Robertson quit the FIS Court last fall and became part of the NY Times leak of the NSA Terrorist Surveillance Program, many people claimed the judge left in protest. Well, Robertson supposedly said is he left because the NSA leads where being used to request FISA warrants on possible terrorist in the country:

Two associates familiar with his decision said yesterday that Robertson privately expressed deep concern that the warrantless surveillance program authorized by the president in 2001 was legally questionable and may have tainted the FISA court’s work.

Note that Robertson is clearly concerned NSA leads were being presented to the FISA Court – not going around the court. The word ‘taint’ clearly indicates the NSA intel was being sent to the court, how else would it ‘taint’ the court’s work?

Well, while we ponder a NY Times story that – again – contradicts its own reporting with a statement by a court insider claiming the opposite of the story’s theme in complete liberal harmony (which means disonance to the rest of us), we learn today Robertson’s replacement was named last month by USSC Cheif Justice Roberts:

U.S. District Judge John D. Bates has been named to replace a judge who resigned from the secretive court set up by Congress to oversee domestic spying.

Bates, a former Whitewater prosecutor, was appointed by Chief Justice John Roberts in February to replace U.S. District Judge James Robertson, who quit shortly after news reports about the Bush administration going around the court to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens suspected of communicating with terrorists.

The appointment was not announced by the court. Secrecy News reported the appointment Friday after it appeared in Bates’ official online biography.

“In February 2006, he was appointed by Chief Justice Roberts to serve as a judge of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court,” according to Bates’ bio on the Web site maintained by the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia.

In what has got to be a stunner to the leftwing, it turns out the good judge worked for Ken Starr:

From 1995 to 1997, he was an assistant U.S. attorney who wor[k]ed for Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr on the investigation into President Clinton’s Whitewater investment deals.

Too funny. Apparently Jayson at Polipundit noted this news as well.