evilrouters.net

elliot cohen, ph.d., posted a piece today entitled “the end of privacy” that’s definitely worthy of a read. in the article, cohen discusses the foreign intelligence surveillance act (fisa) that is a huge violation of american’s fourth amendment rights.

personally, i don’t see how people can just by and allow the government to take their freedoms away. i lost some of mine years ago when, at the age of 19 or 20, i was an dumb kid and committed a felony. i’d really like to keep the ones that i still have left.

though the phrase (and many similar ones) is often incorrectly attributed to benjamin franklin and we’ve all heard it before, it’s definitely proving true (in the united states):

“those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety”.

i don’t want to summarize the whole article — which describes the project for the new american century — because i definitely think everyone should read it, but i do want to quote the last paragraph:

it would be a mistake to underestimate the resolve of the bush administration. but it would be a bigger mistake for americans not to stand united against this familiar pattern of government scare tactics and manipulation. there are grave dangers to the survival of democracy posted by allowing any present or future government unfettered access to all of our private electronic communications. these dangers must be carefully weighed against the dubious and unproven benefits that granting such an awesome power to government might have on fending off cyber-attacks.

and with that, i’m off to compose a letter to my governmental representation in washington.