DOROTHY RABINOWITZ: A SONG OF VICTIMS
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323734304578541121465226816.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_MIDDLESecond
For the school of believers certain that an all-powerful American government regularly plots to invade their lives and subvert their freedom, these are heady days—or so they seemed. News of data mining looked to be irresistible proof of that faith—their darkest vision of an America at the mercy of a government secretly gathering all sorts of personal information and subverting the Constitution. And there was Edward Snowden, the latest addition to the pantheon of anti-government leakers, releasing a tonnage of classified data about the NSA surveillance programs.
For this he was, not unexpectedly, acclaimed as a hero both in the precincts of the Progressive Left and its anti-terror war warriors, and some quarters of the Libertarian Right—two groups, it has long been obvious, with much in common.
Trouble is, this latest face of self-sacrifice for a higher cause (Snowden has let it be known he considers his life as a free man pretty much over now) hasn’t been greeted with anything remotely like admiration among Americans, other than sympathizers in the aforementioned groups. From all indications, he’s an object of general contempt well deserving of prosecution—another in the line of socially deranged seekers who found the self-definition they long for in their obsessed vision of their government as the central source of evil in the world. It didn’t help that Mr. Snowden’s explanation for what he did came brimming odiously with virtue—he had, he said, decided to leak material because he thought Americans should be informed so that they could debate the questions he raised.
The number of Americans who hold it as revealed truth that the great peril in their lives is government intrusiveness—as opposed, say, to the menace of terrorist assaults, which the surveillance programs are intended to deter—is small, if vocal. They have been out in force, awash in talk-show oratory over the threat of government surveillance, the checking of phone records. Republican Sen. Rand Paul has announced plans for a class-action lawsuit against the government designed to end the surveillance—a suit he invited young Americans, especially, to join. We look forward with interest to the Rand Paul Children’s Crusade.
The senator also said that he believed the American people were with him. The overwhelming majority of citizens—who have no trouble recognizing the necessity of anti-terror measures, and who do not consider themselves victims of the government because it has undertaken such efforts—may be inclined to dispute that.
Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky
For this he was, not unexpectedly, acclaimed as a hero both in the precincts of the Progressive Left and its anti-terror war warriors, and some quarters of the Libertarian Right—two groups, it has long been obvious, with much in common.
Trouble is, this latest face of self-sacrifice for a higher cause (Snowden has let it be known he considers his life as a free man pretty much over now) hasn’t been greeted with anything remotely like admiration among Americans, other than sympathizers in the aforementioned groups. From all indications, he’s an object of general contempt well deserving of prosecution—another in the line of socially deranged seekers who found the self-definition they long for in their obsessed vision of their government as the central source of evil in the world. It didn’t help that Mr. Snowden’s explanation for what he did came brimming odiously with virtue—he had, he said, decided to leak material because he thought Americans should be informed so that they could debate the questions he raised.
The number of Americans who hold it as revealed truth that the great peril in their lives is government intrusiveness—as opposed, say, to the menace of terrorist assaults, which the surveillance programs are intended to deter—is small, if vocal. They have been out in force, awash in talk-show oratory over the threat of government surveillance, the checking of phone records. Republican Sen. Rand Paul has announced plans for a class-action lawsuit against the government designed to end the surveillance—a suit he invited young Americans, especially, to join. We look forward with interest to the Rand Paul Children’s Crusade.
The senator also said that he believed the American people were with him. The overwhelming majority of citizens—who have no trouble recognizing the necessity of anti-terror measures, and who do not consider themselves victims of the government because it has undertaken such efforts—may be inclined to dispute that.
Comments are closed.
