Wiretapping is topic dejour:
New Poll Finds Mixed Support for Wiretaps
Americans are willing to tolerate eavesdropping without warrants, but are also concerned about civil liberties.In a sign that public opinion about the trade-offs between national security and individual rights is nuanced and remains highly unresolved, responses to questions about the administration's eavesdropping program varied significantly depending on how the questions were worded, underlining the importance of the effort by the White House this week to define the issue on its terms.
Yeah, no shit? So, if the poll question is worded, “Do you support wiretapping of bin Laden's personal phone”, the answer is a resounding, “but sure, officer”. And if the poll question mentions that the wiretaps might have a broader target, including lots of innocent folks with absolutely nothing to do with terrorism (or drugs, or criticizing our Incompetent-in-Chief), suddenly, not so popular. Hmmm.
In one striking finding, respondents overwhelmingly supported e-mail and telephone monitoring directed at “Americans that the government is suspicious of;” they overwhelmingly opposed the same kind of surveillance if it was aimed at “ordinary Americans.”
Does anyone who pays attention believe that the GWB assministration is smart enough, competent enough to 'aim' surveillance at 'terrorists' when they still don't have enough Arabic translators to even keep up with the data already collected?
Tags: Impeachment, /terrorism, /Worst_President
