Why We Must Draw Lines
By Alan Stewart Carl | Related entries in The War On TerrorismAs expected, the amateur spindoctors of the right (aka rightwing partisan bloggers) are pretending like the news that the NSA is collecting our phone records is no big deal. The always well-written yet routinely vapid Power Line even entitled their post NSA Accused of Protecting Americans from Terrorists. As far as Power Line is concerned, those who are complaining are just whining liberals who hate America.
Well I’m not a liberal and I love this nation and I am disturbed that the NSA is collecting data about my calling habits. And you know why? Because we are a nation of lines drawn to ensure the few who run our government can never overpower the many who make up our nation. The entire Constitution was designed to dilute power and ensure that the people have ultimate control. That model breaks down when we allow government agencies to watch us without any oversight or any congressionally-provided authority.
Look, it’s not that I’m all bent out of shape over this specific program. I really don’t think my freedom is significantly or even marginally jeopardized just because somewhere a government agency has a record of my calling patterns.
That’s not the point. The point is: if the NSA needs no congressional authority to create this call-monitoring program, what else can they do? If we don’t draw lines now, what’s to stop the NSA or any other government agency from going further down this path�monitoring our credit card purchases let’s say. Or tracking our movements?
Some say if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear. That’s pure ignorance. There is always reason to fear consolidated power. And the more information our government has on us, the more power they wield over us.
The question is: how much monitoring do we want to endure in our quest for national security? This is not a question for the NSA or the Executive Branch to decide alone. This is a question for us ALL to decide. And don’t tell me that if we reveal our tactics, the terrorists gain an advantage. As far as I’m concerned, the NSA and other agencies can do whatever specific actions are necessary to track down and eliminate terrorists. My concern is with these big-net programs that have the potential of catching a significant number of innocent citizens without ever snagging a terrorist.
We simply must live by the lessons of our Founders and avoid putting undue trust in the good will of our government. We must not abdicate important decisions to the few who are in power. That’s our responsibility as citizens. To argue otherwise is simply missing the point.
This entry was posted on Friday, May 12th, 2006 and is filed under The War On Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
May 12th, 2006 at 3:02 pm
Today, I’ve been called a left-winger, anti-American, and against our rule of law. Between the Snoopgate and the Fletcher indictment, I’ve been very busy over the last couple days.
A comment left on my blog earlier today reminds us all that the Bill of Rights was created to protect privacy. As I have often said, the oath of office is to “Preserve, protect, and defend” those rights. The NSA and this President do not “ensure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity,” but instead are leaving us in a fear-mongering police state.
-The American Moderate Party
May 12th, 2006 at 3:43 pm
I’ve still never seen anyone siding with the President on this issue who will explain how the NSA data-mining program could not be further abused by a future Administration, or how it can be effectively checked by the other branches of government (except, of course, the beleaguered “fourth house” of the MSM). But then, that was the case for the habeas corpus, torture, and extradition scandals too.
Any takers?
May 12th, 2006 at 4:49 pm
After all the deceit we’ve seen, George Bush telling us to trust him is the equivalent of Iran’s Ahmedinejad telling the world to trust that they aren’t going after nukes.
In both cases, we’re being told there is no sinister intent while being denied verification. The two are incompatible.
See my er … rant at: George, Don’t You Get It? (http://eclecticfloridian.blogspot.com/2006/05/george-dont-you-get-it.html)