Dear Member of the Daily Kos,
”America will never be destroyed from the outside.
If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because
we destroyed ourselves.” - Abraham Lincoln
We always been told that spying on the citizens is a prerogative of the totalitarian states such as Communist or Nazi regimes. We seen horrors of such unwarranted mass spying, which are indeed terrible, in both dramas like The Lives of Others or and futuristic films such as Brazil. And we always thought that this could not happen in US. But we have been lied to and spied on.
As recently as in June of this year in interview on Charlie Rose show president Obama said
The way I view it, my job is both to protect the American people and to protect the American way of life, which includes our privacy. And so every program that we engage in, what I’ve said is “Let’s examine and make sure that we’re making the right tradeoffs.”
That was before we learned a true scope of the NSA programs, including heads of our allies among other 35 states, tens of millions of people in different countries around the world and probably most of the citizens of this country. Now after initial shock and disbelieve most people must have realized that the illegal spying was going on for a long time, in violation of court orders, not just by NSA and that FISA law is one big loophole. Yet, there was still some hope that things might change and that legislature will wake up from coma of narcissistic greatness and trans of patriotic propaganda and will close the loopholes that took away rights guaranteed by the American Constitution that they swore to uphold and defend.
That all has changed on Thursday last week (read the article in article in Washington Post ) when a bill that would validate NSA’s harvesting of phone, e-mail records cleared the Senate Intelligence Committee and progressed to the full Senate. If the FISA Improvements Act will become law, “Congress effectively will be validating expansive powers that have been claimed by the NSA and upheld by a court — but never explicitly written into statute — to harvest the phone and e-mail records of millions of Americans”. Commission Chairwoman Senator Dianne Feinstein who condemned NSA spying on Angela Merkel and other foreign leaders apparently is fine with rest of the “Spying Without Borders” program and even wants it to become a law. She is not concerned with the Constitutional rights of the people as much as she concerned with their “security”. Sen. Feinstein already forgot the results of investigation of September 11 attack, when the NSA intercepted message about date of the attack was translated after it had already happen and how Bush administration despite having all information about the attack did nothing to prevent it. It also would be wise to waste $2 billion allocated for construction of the building the country’s biggest spy center. At the end of his presidency Eisenhower warned about dangers of Military-Industrial Complex, but it is unlikely that president Obama will warn us about dangers of Intelligence-Industrial Complex because after all Eisenhower was Great War General and Obama is a Constitutional Law Professor.
We have been fooled and scared after 9/11 when our representatives in Congress voted for Patriot Act and took our Constitutional right to privacy and protection from unwarranted searches and wiretapping. Can we trust them to do it for the second (or third depending if we to count renewal of the Patriot Act) time? It is our Constitutional Right and it is their Political Decision—and it is much easier for politicians to sacrifice our rights than taking responsibility for their bad decisions and sloppy work representing our interests. We cannot afford to watch it and do nothing.
Please, help us to spread the word and consider signing our Petition addressed to the Congress and President asking them instead of legalizing blanked warrantless wiretapping of phones and e-mails to reform FISA law and prevent abuses of spying on everyone without reasonable and probable cause.