Who's Listening?

Although President Obama and the National Security Agency assure us they aren't listening in to our telephone conversations or reading our email or text messages, they have admitted to using various monitoring programs designed to fight terrorism. Programs that the ACLU types and others are objecting to most strenuously.

In reply, government officials, including the president, have replied to criticism by saying, essentially, "No pain, no gain." 

According to the president, "It's important to recognize that you can't have 100% security and also then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience," Obama said. "We're going to have to make some choices as a society. And what I can say is that in evaluating these programs, they make a difference in our capacity to anticipate and prevent possible terrorist activity."

 The most recent revelations about the program come from a 29-year-old NSA contractor and former CIA employee who has identified himself as the source of the leak and tells reporters he spoke out because he realized he was part of a program that was doing more harm than good. In his opinion.

So, on the one hand, we have a guy who, presumably, was sworn to secrecy but decided that, since he disagreed with the government, he would speak out anyway. And on the other we have a government that is spying on its citizens but assures us that it's really for our own good.

It's an interesting dilemma.

Is the private contractor who spoke up a whistle blower? Or, as some have suggested, is he a spy for the Chinese government? Should he be lauded or prosecuted...or both?

In the broadcasting business, there's a saying: "Every camera is live; every microphone is on." It's designed to remind those of us who sometimes speak out of turn that our words may be heard by many, many more folks than we intended...sometimes with disastrous results.

So let's change it up a bit for these more challenging times:

"Every camera is live; every microphone is on. Every email, text, post to Facebook and Twitter and Pinterest and Tumblr, and every picture of our children (and our critters, God bless them) , can be intercepted, analyzed, recorded, and filed as a classified document which can then be used against us in a court of law or when we want to take an overseas cruise or go fishing in Canada."

And, frankly, if my government feels that to protect me from a terrorist attack, it has to assign someone to read about my cat's diarrhea,I hope they choose a well-vetted, trusted employee who won't go running off at the mouth.