What Don't They Understand?

'They' are Obama, Biden and other putative liberals or progressives, who have signed onto--and defend--the massive surveillance of practically everyone, world-wide, including American citizens in the US, that the intelligence complex has foisted on all of us. Obama was a constitutional law professor; he should know about all the guaranteed rights that PRISM and meta-data collection violate. Instead, he pursues Ed Snowden to the ends of the earth.

Apparently, the American public doesn't understand, either.

Of course, there are all sorts of justifications: US citizens aren't targeted--unless they are. We have to sweep up all the world's communications to protect the American people, although we do a terrible job protecting, except for ferreting out the credulous in stings: occasionally there is the miniscule chance that someone will set off a bomb. Many more are killed, routinely, because our gun laws are so lax, because we travel faster on the roads than they're designed for, because we have a healthcare system driven by profit--and a corporate system in which human lives are less important than dividends.

So, to stop the occasional mad man, we give up our rights to privacy; we bow to government and corporate power and don't think about it: it's more important to know what the celebs are doing, or whether your team is winning. It's preferable to spend hundreds of millions on stadiums than to fully fund food stamps, so that people don't go hungry.

What does that have to do with the NSA's surveillance? The Terror Industry is a diversion, of money that could be used to make people's lives better, of attention away from the escalating inequality enabled by that same inattention: if you're terrified of terrorists, you won't think about how your CEO is exploiting you, and your government is watching your every move. You certainly won't rebel against the system, even if you sense it's been shaped to rip you off. The surveillance state tells you: you can't get away with anything, especially protest against your government.

Go scream about abortion, instead; or oral sex. Your surveillers will even support you: social issues are safe; but economic ones are not: taxes must go down--in inverse relation to your income, and regulations must be dismantled, to free private enterprise--so it can exploit everyone more efficiently.

Surveillance and police control, even with tanks, will enable the government--or select corporations--to protect their privileges, against massive unrest. Yes, the US is ready if American dissidents try to bring Tahrir Square to Washington or New York. Police have already crushed Occupy--while the IRS targeted "progressive" groups about as much as the Tea Party.

Democratic hacks seek support from the corporate class, our Roman Senators: Republicans slavishly represent them.

Roman Senators--and the defense-industrial-intelligence-complex--lay the groundwork for a legal coup: NSA's General Keith Alexander for President!