We have to put our trust in the NSA, because that is the mission it has. If we can’t, we have to FIX the NSA, not spill secrets to our enemies.
I didn’t particularly like the Patriot Act, and I think the type of data mining we are learning about is way too easy to be abused relative to the gains we might get.
But we have no idea what gains we get, because it is all rightly classified. We have to have people we trust to review the actual workings of the programs, and we don’t have a trustworthy government.
But that is our fault (Americans), because we elected untrustworthy people. We can fix that, if we as Americans actually care enough.
I’ve found it problematic that having a court review is supposed to “make it all better”. Frankly, I don’t see how trusting ONE JUDGE to make this decision makes it LESS likely for abuse. I’d rather have the oversight of the relevant committees in congress. Yes, they might not be trustworthy either, but they are 8 elected representatives of the people, who supposedly are trusted by their peers who were also elected.
Once you lose trust, nothing works. We have to trust the President not to launch nuclear weapons. We have to trust our military leaders not to turn their weapons on us. We have to trust cops not to abuse their power.
As our institutions are taken over by untrustworthy and even criminal elements, society breaks down.
This is a major reason that we need power devolved to the lowest possible level, as opposed to our modern push to put all power at the top. YOu can have many corrupt local officials, but they only impact the locals, and the locals have the best chance at fixing the problem through political means, if they want.
I don’t want anybody to think they have the right to take classified data and leak it to the press. If he had leaked it to a congressman, I’d feel differently. Once we support ONE person giving up secrets, we’ll have everybody giving up secrets, and most of them we will not support.