Surveillance has been around for a long time. Everyone wants to know what someone else is doing. Now in the case of increased terrorism at our front doors, people want even more but in order to know who the bad guys are, we must all be looked at.  After the 911 attacks, Americans said it is ok . Do whatever you need to do to get the bad guys and gave little or no opposition to whatever new agencies or laws that were passed. Her we are 15 years later and we are still numb and don’t even know much of how much surveillance there is going on out there about us.

It was called the Patriot Act in which on June 1^st our government must come to a decision as to what to do with it. Certain provisions in that act are due to expire on June 1^st. The most controversial part of the Patriot Act which is up for renewal is Section 215. Have I lost you already to boredom? This is important. The section says that the government can ask for any things as long as it is to be used for protection against an international terrorist attack. This broad statement has been interpreted by our government to mean that they can keep the phone records of every American. Does that instantly make us all spies that must be watched carefully? The majority of us do not have any connection to terrorism.

The government points out that they hold phone records but not the calls itself.  If they wanted to find out more it is easy with this information.  Then there comes a government worker, Eric Snoden who decides it is a good idea to give to the press lots of information of personal citizen’s records.  I think it is more incredible that a 29 year old worker was able to steal top secret documents from the  National Security Administration that literally has the word Security in its name. Did he help Americans by exposing how much we are being watched or is he just a stupid kid releasing stuff he shouldn’t have his hands on? Besides, most stupid Americans don’t even know who he is but they know that Bruce Jenner is going to have a sex change.

It has been 2 years later and most of us have even forgotten the content of what he leaked. People think he is the Wiki Leaks guy. That guy is Jullian  Assange. who is an Australian Publisher that started a website called Wiki Leaks that publishes secret information he gets from everywhere. He is not an American worker.  Eric Snoden is somewhere between wanting perfect security by expecting perfect privacy. Well, that is impossible.   Did Congress really want bulk collections of every American’s phone calls? They are too busy working on their tans and re-election campaigns to even know what they voted on. There has been only one terrorist plot averted through this Section 215 program that has everyone angry about. Meanwhile Eric ran to Moscow to avoid being sent to prison here.

We care about surveillance on our shores but Americans still say do what you want when it comes to international terrorism. Americans don’t even know where their information is or goes. It is a complicated situation and all I know is that we don’t need more Eric Snoden’s  releasing crap to the press making things even more complicated.