The Slumbering August Media Awakes...

The NSA Scandal Is All That: a Rebuttal to Marc Ambinder
The backlash against the surveillance state is not overblown.
...

I'll tell you this. When I see DNI Clapper lying to Congress about the NSA without consequences; a chair of the Senate oversight committee who hadn't seen an audit documenting thousands of abuses per year until the press contacted her; a Patriot Act author who says he was shocked to discover the way the law had been interpreted; repeated NSA successes avoiding legal challenges on their merits; and an agency where no one ever seems to be fired for violating rules, the law, or the Constitution, I don't see accountability; I see lack of accountability. One needn't think "all government power is inherently corrosive" to reach that conclusion.

Conor Friedersdorf of theatlantic.com isn't in Paris this summer sampling wines and learning a new language, nor is he busy putting relatives on the payroll for a employer-paid 'plane trip across America', whereupon he discovers things like riding lawnmowers in those areas of the country with open acreage.

Instead,
in these days of doubling down on policy mistakes,
Friedersdorf pushes back on the pre-conceived idea that the majority of Americans are A-OK with rewriting the Constitution and giving up our liberties so the Big Beautiful People in Power can keep us safe and secure forever. (Unless mistakes happen... and then the BBPiP's are given immunity from the consequences of their actions. See: the financial sector bailout... win-ning.)

It's not well written -- too long, too listy, too personal (keep your salary out of the story. Too tangential), and in dire need of editing to keep his thoughts tightly focused. But at least the intent is there.

Younger people here in the United States have a longer and richer history of liberty than other geopolitically precariously-situated countries, like our ally Israel, say. If we're indeed 'all in this together' in the seemingly never-ending War on Terrorism, then -- like with NAFTA -- Americans should expect to see their own rights diminished here at home to match what other peoples put up with to grow and settle their own homeland.

Seems we're not the world's policemen anymore, merely the gunrunners...

Perhaps one day, here at home, we'll consent to razing the family homes of convicted criminals here too, as collective punishment. Perhaps, as our courts become more and more secretive, political and partisan, we too will one day sweep up people to imprison without bringing formal charges or court action. Simply detention without charges.

Perhaps too -- shudder to think it -- one day our military will be incentivized to override the voters' choices and install leaders at gunpoint.

It's not the American way.
It's not what got us this far: faith in fellowship, and sticking with our Good Book -- the Constitution -- even when we've humanly failed it, as in Plessy or Korematsu.

Time will tell whether Americans are willing to sacrifice more and more of our cherished freedoms on the altar of security, ostensibly to look out for our own.