All That’s Given Up in the Name of Security

You may ask how NSA eavesdropping
affects you when you have nothing to hide. Let us try to explain why you should
worry. Even if, as the government
claims, this program is only looking for “terrorist activity,” still all your conversations have to be
processed; have to be linked to other calls and sources of “possible” terrorist
activity. All it takes is an
innocent phone call to a friend, who has placed a call to a friend or relative,
who has legitimate business or personal contacts in a foreign country where
there may be “suspected terrorists.” You have just become a potential target of
government investigation – you may be a terrorist supporter, or even a
terrorist. Remember “Six Degrees of
Separation” (the
theory that anyone on earth can be connected to any other person on the planet
through a chain of acquaintances with no more than five intermediaries)? The NSA
program can easily mistakenly connect you to a terrorist.  Furthermore, since the program is being
conducted without judicial oversight and under no recognized process there is
nothing to restrict how the information obtained under the program is being
used.

But let us take things from the
widely shared point of view of the individual quoted above; the view that there
is nothing for honest people to fear from warrantless, presidentially-ordered
surveillance. What other invasions
of rights would such acquiescence to government authority inevitably lead
to?

Our government will argue its right
to break into your house and search it without warrant based on some tip,
intelligence, or information that is considered classified, which you have no
right or clearance to know about. It will argue that the search and the secrecy
are necessary for reasons of “national security” and within the “inherent
powers” of the executive branch, therefore not requiring congressional
authorization or judicial oversight.

What is next in the name of national
security? Will our government call out to all citizens in particular communities
to turn in their weapons to law enforcement agencies? Perhaps it will cite the following
reason for such call: “We already know that several Al Qaeda cells reside in the
affected communities. Our intelligence agencies have received credible
information concerning these cells’ intention to break into Americans’ homes to
obtain firearms, since they do not want to risk detection by purchasing firearms
from the market.” Would our compliant citizen quoted above be more than happy to
give up his right under the Second Amendment for possible security promised to
him by his government? When the
agents show up at his door asking for his legally registered Colt, what will he
do?

There are those
well-meaning “conservative” Americans who have been lead to believe that our
nation’s security is somehow damaged when an employee of one of our “security”
agencies comes forward to shed light on activities by our government that may be
illegal, may be un-constitutional, and may be a danger to the nation’s security.
These Americans have accepted too easily the government’s propaganda sold to
them shrewdly packaged in a wrapping of fear of terror – that if you expose any
government action, however misguided or un-constitutional, then you are
jeopardizing our security; you are aiding the terrorists. This quote from
Benjamin Franklin sums it up well: “They that can give up essential liberty to
obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

What price our
imagined security? If we now would allow the NSA to listen in to our most
private conversations without objection, then when next the knock comes on our
door, or our door is knocked down, in the interest of “national security” what
will we say? Will we say “come on in and search me, my house and my family;
after all, it is in the interest of ‘national security’ and we have nothing to
hide”? Generations of Americans have fought and died so that we can today enjoy
the precious fruits of their struggles – the right to our privacy, the right to
our freedom from government intrusion, the right to our freedom of speech, the
right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” the right to simply be
left alone. Are we to become the generation that loses those freedoms, not only
for ourselves, but for the generations that follow? And will it be us who lets
it happen because of some misplaced belief that government “oppression” equals
“national security”?

Since when did true
conservatives agree to surrender their individual rights under the Constitution
for the sake of some imagined temporary security? Since when have we become so
afraid of some foreign terrorists that we shiver and hide under a blanket of
imagined security offered up by those in power who feed on our fears? Since when
have we forgotten the messages of the Founding Fathers, who understood so
clearly that the greatest danger to our liberties is an oppressive government,
not outside foreign forces? We should never fear those who are brave enough to
speak out, but we should fear greatly those who would silence
them.

We like to believe our nation is one
that prizes individual liberty and freedom from authoritarian restraint, the
dictates of hierarchy, or governmental limits. Throughout its history our
nation’s soul has been based on anti-authoritarianism and fear of a large,
tyrannical government. Our notion of liberty has been built upon a philosophy of
limited government with the highest value placed on preservation of individual
rights. Our nation’s political thought found its roots in the writings of John
Locke, who stressed an insistence on imposing limits on authority, on
governmental authority, in order to further individual rights and liberty. No
wonder both liberal and republican traditions, although each in its own way and
style, pride themselves in their eternal quest for ‘limited
government’.

Our entire system of government and
its institutions is grounded in an insistence that tyranny be combated and that
individual liberty be protected from a potentially tyrannical government. The
result is a suspicion of authority and an emphasis on limited government. Samuel
Huntington, a well-known conservative Republican, states in American Politics: The Promise of
Disharmony: “The distinctive aspect of the American Creed is its
antigovernment character. Opposition to power, and suspicion of government as
the most dangerous embodiment of power, are the central themes of American
political thought.”

After 9/11 our president came out
and warned us: “the terrorists are
resolved to change the way of our lives. They hate our freedom and our way of
life here.” Well Mr. President, we have come a long way since that awful
day. Our way of privacy in communicating on the phone and through our computers,
our way of detaining and prosecuting people, our way of trusting our records
with our librarians, our way of reading and discussing dissent, our way of
treating our ally nations, our way of making it from the airport gates to the
airplanes…simply, our way of life,
has surely changed drastically in five years. But, Mr. President, we don’t have
the terrorists to blame for this. We only have you and our three branches of
government to blame.

Sibel Edmonds

Sibel Edmonds worked
as a language specialist for the FBI’s Washington Field Office.
During her work with the bureau, she discovered and reported serious
acts of security breaches, cover-ups, and intentional blocking of
intelligence that had national security implications. After she
reported these acts to FBI management, she was retaliated against by
the FBI and ultimately fired in March 2002. Since that time, court
proceedings on her issues have been blocked by the assertion of
“State Secret Privilege” by Attorney General Ashcroft; the Congress
of the United States has been gagged and prevented from any
discussion of her case through retroactive re-classification by the
Department of Justice. Ms. Edmonds is fluent in Turkish, Farsi and
Azerbaijani; and has a MA in Public Policy and International
Commerce from George Mason University, and a BA in Criminal Justice
and Psychology from George Washington University.
PEN American Center
awarded Ms. Edmonds the 2006 PEN/Newman’s Own First Amendment Award for
her “commitment to preserving the free flow of information in the United
States in a time of growing international isolation and increasing
government secrecy”.

Professor William Weaver