Top Sekrit (tm)

I've been having problems with blogger lately, and I think the NSA has been thwarting my efforts to rabble-rouse (or something) by making it very difficult for me to spread my propaganda. And speaking of the NSA and the secret spying program, my knee-jerk response that all things Bush does are inherently TeH Evil (tm).

However, on an intellectual level, the program makes me uncomfortable. I'm probably a minority opinion on this, but honestly, I don't feel like the 'war on terror' is something anyone can win and to claim that it's possible is misleading. For that reason, I'm reluctant to suspend my civil rights for some phantom enemy who is a) more creative than Bush (or any other president, for that matter) will ever be, b) not afraid to die, and c) whose only goal in life is to kill other people.

Plus, the program just doesn't make sense to me. If only four warrants out of thousands had been denied, what's the problem? The courts are obviously not standing in the way of the 'war on terror'. And if you can get a warrant retroatively up to 72 hours after beginning spying, what's the need to circumvent the courts entirely? To me, it sounds like a power-grab, an expansion of executive privilege, and it's disturbing to me. I don't want this nebulous 'war on terror' to be the raison d'etre for every decision every succeeding administration makes from here on out. It's almost like you can go out into a crowd, wave an American flag, repeat catch phrases over and over again, and equate criticism with unpatriotism, and everyone falls neatly into line without actually considering the consequences or even the reality of the situation.

In our local paper, nearly 60 percent of people polled in an unscientic poll said they'd be willing to give up their civil liberties in order to win the 'war on terror'. Count me in the other 40 percent.