The claim that governments are not stopping terrorists is ridiculous. There are people who are sitting in jail right now who have pled guilty to plotting terrorist attacks that were prevented. No, you can never stop all terrorist attacks, but that is a poor reason to not bother preventing others. You are free to argue that current surveillance practices did not actually help prevent these attacks, or that additional regulation and oversight is necessary, or that you'd rather have the terrorist attacks than any surveillance, or that terrorist attacks are really the fault of some U.S. policy that should be corrected, or whatever else you want, but whatever you argue you really should not just avoid reality and invent your own.
You're correct. Some plots have been stopped. And how they were stopped is important. And that's something the media should be talking about as well as chasing Snowden.
As an aside if I was inventing my own reality it would be a lot nicer than the front page of the Guardian today. While the right-hand story is Snowden the left-hand story is exactly why his leak is so important.
> who have pled guilty to plotting terrorist attacks that were prevented
The fact that them pleading guilty played a major part in their conviction should tell you a lot about how much effort was put into getting them to plead guilty, if you catch my drift.
>There are people who are sitting in jail right now who have pled guilty to plotting terrorist attacks that were prevented.
Well that proves it doesn't it! Except that those people were entrapped by the US government. Talked into doing attacks they'd have never actually done sans government involvement and suggestion.
The actual terrorist attacks that have been tried either worked or failed because the terrorist was incompetent. In any case, terrorism is such a minuscule cause of death or injury that there is no reason to even consider it. Just ignore it like the gnat that it is.
I, and many others I suspect, would just prefer to have a CHOICE - and some CONTROL of our own lives.
If you prefer the safety and protection of this New America, then you are welcome to it.
But if there were an Old America, an America ruled by the original words and meanings of the Constitution, an America where you could be proud of the goals and ideals of your government, yet humble and grateful that you and your family were part of it - THAT America is the one I would CHOOSE to live in, and the one I would defend with my life if called upon.
> If you prefer the safety and protection of this New America, then you are welcome to it.
He didn't write that, though, did he? He merely asserted that a very broad spying program was likely to have nabbed some actual bad guys. I don't get why people can't simultaneously believe that and also be against all the secret courts and lack of checks and balances, or indeed the spying itself.
