Behemothic surveillance is the enemy of freedom. [View all]

[sibelian]

State apparatus must serve the populace, not the other way round.

The individual cogs in the State machinery, the people who punch in the database queries, collate data, establish profiles, are no different from you or I. They are flawed. They sin.

They are bribable.

The more flexibility and power you give a surveillance system over the populace it is supposed to protect, the more scope for abuse you allow. Any decent law enforcement officer will tell you how easy it is to frame someone if you work in the right positions.

The NSA itself does not need to be "malevolent" (although there is no reason to assume it isn't, or that it's benevolent) for it to become a toxic influence on the public discourse.

It's not at all difficult to place a convenient "witness" near a prominent public figure in a moment of weakness in order to discredit their efforts, in any political field, to provide a useful cover for having found out about that weakness via other means and then conflate the efforts of that prominent public figure with that weakness. Anyone's life looks strange when it's covered with sparkly graphics and put on TV. Rampant speculation about the consequences of such weakness don't hurt either.

Remind you of anything, DU?

All it comes down to is what a focussed, amoral individual, or a group of similar, is/are willing to do to get what they want. Are we going to assume that political figures are universally trustworthy because some, or even most, are?

Why would someone seek a position of power? For worthy purposes?

Why not other purposes?

Who's phoning who?

Why?

How can we turn that to our advantage?

What's it worth to YOU, Mr Cog? Don't worry.

No-one will find out.