Liberty
July 2nd, 2007 |This country was founded upon the concept of personal freedom and liberty. The founding fathers were willing to risk the very viability of this country in order to prevent authoritarian rule. That’s why we don’t have a king.
I was listening to KTLK’s Dan Conry last week who was discussing the opposition the President’s domestic spying program, the Patriot Act, the immigration bill and other security issues. His comment was that the United States needed to get hit again with a terrorist attack similar to 9/11 for American’s to ‘get it’.
Get what?
Just how much of your liberty are you willing to cede to the government for the illusion of safety? Because no matter how much surveillance is done your safety is just that, an illusion. Terrorism is inevitable and future terror attacks within the United States are assured.
Look at Britain and their 4.2 million closed circuit TV cameras across their country.
It was recently estimated that the average Briton is captured by electronic eyes more than 300 times on a typical workday.
Is Britain any safer with this kind of government surveillance? The attempted terrorist attacks of last weekend, though incompetently carried out, prove that attacks can still happen. Does this mean that the answer is even more surveillance?
There are many here in the United States that would be more than happy to embrace the direction that Britain is going. What is the next step when it is proven that these measures are not sufficient to stop terrorism? Do you want the government bugging your house? Your car? Do you want the government knowing where you are and what you are up to 24 hours a day?
“We were in the town center and I’d got some chips at McDonald’s for my daughter Ellie, but they were hot so I tipped them into a box and crumpled the packet up. I put it on the bottom of Ellie’s pram to take home but then heard this voice say: ‘Please place the rubbish in the bin provided.’”
Make no mistake, it is not possible to eliminate the possibility of terrorist attack. But if we hand over our rights and our liberty to the government we may as well re-institute the monarchy.
