Those restrictions directly affect (in his opinion) his job. It's not like he's scoring points for his local constituents, or trying to nuke a bill sponsored by opponents from another political party. He's saying this "hand wringing" is having an impact - pretty obvious statement from someone in the direct position to know.
Effectively he's saying 'If I had had my hands free these attacks might not have happened', and that's several bridges too far in my opinion. There is no proof that it would have made a difference, in fact with the tools currently at his disposal given the scope of these attacks it is fairly clear it just doesn't work.
Those terrorist plots (real ones, not ones all but executed by the authorities) that were foiled were foiled either by coincidence or by personal bravery of one or two people that happened to be accidentally on the scene.
Maybe, I'll concede that much, if a total surveillance state were operational where each and every one of us had a continuous cops eye following us attacks like these could be prevented. But that's in my opinion not world worth living in. Open societies are vulnerable to small numbers of assholes working in a coordinated fashion. And that's something that will be very hard to fix without changing that society for ever so let's not run down that path before the victims of these crimes are even in the ground and think things over for a bit.
> Those restrictions directly affect (in his opinion) his job. It's not like he's scoring points for his local constituents,
The points he is trying to score are with politicians to untie his hands and give him more power. So yes, that is what he is doing. He conveniently ignores France already passed and implemented his "Dream" of being able to engage in highly intrusive surveillance methods without judicial oversight.
> The new bill, which allows intelligence agencies to tap phones and emails without seeking permission from a judge, sparked protests from rights groups who claimed it would legalise highly intrusive surveillance methods without guarantees for individual freedom and privacy.
> The surveillance measures authorized by this law are wildly out of proportion. Large swathes of France’s population could soon find themselves under surveillance on obscure grounds and without prior judicial approval.
> The Turkish authorities warned their French counterparts twice in the past year about one of the attackers, Ismaël Omar Mostefaï, a 29-year-old French citizen who was known by the authorities as someone who had radical Islamist beliefs, an official said on Monday.
> The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, in line with government protocol, said the government never heard back from France and only received an “information request” about Mr. Mostefaï after the Paris attacks.
> During an investigation, the Turkish authorities identified Mostefai and notified their French counterparts twice – in December 2014 and June 2015 – the official said.
> “We have, however, not heard back from France on the matter,” the official said. “It was only after the Paris attacks that the Turkish authorities received an information request about Omar Ismail Mostefai from France.”
