Apparently There Really Is No Such Thing As Being Too Paranoid

NSA collecting phone records of millions daily, court order reveals
Exclusive: Top secret court order requiring Verizon to hand over all call data shows scale of domestic surveillance under Obama

Of course this makes me furious. Then I read the reader comments and I get sobered right up. Being the Guardian, the readership immediately thinks the Arab Spring would be a good example to follow:

• Maybe our leaders would be less happy with an 'Arab Spring' on their own doorstep.
• You mean like the gigantic protest before the Iraq war? With so many people you couldn't see the end of it? Yeah. They don't care. Maybe it's time for an American Spring. [Me: Really? The Iraq invasion was hugely popular with the American people at the time. I was there. However many protestors there were, they were not representative of the American people.]
• Yes. I was there. And that's exactly what I mean. The difference between the Arabs and us is that we packed up and left when they stayed. Some of them have ousted their tyrants as a direct result. Why did we give in so easily? If the intent was to stop war, why did we stop when it started? That is a question that haunts me (even though I haven't stopped protesting). [Me: I wonder if this guy spent last year at an Occupy Wall Street camp. Probably. Yeah, those are the people I trust to run things!]

I see comments like this and I wonder: do they really think people in Egypt are better off now than they were under Mubarak? Persecution of Coptic Christians has moved into official public policy and women who dare walk the streets uncovered are tormented, attacked, even raped. The entire economy has crashed and repressive Islamist thugs hold the reigns of power.

Yes, rebellion has no innate moral value. It matters what you are rebelling against and what you do once you have power. Anyone who glorifies the "Arab Spring" is clearly not someone to trust with power.

Furthermore, we already have the most enlightened constitution and governmental system in the history of the world. We don't need to rebel against it as an institution, we just need to restore it. Once  you've accepted that mob action is justified, you've unleashed a beast that no one can control. I strongly doubt the "American street" is high-minded enough at this stage to stop at restoring the republic.

Fortunately, I don't think we're that close to fulfilling the dreams of the sort of lefty-anarchists who frequent the Guardian. I know a lot of Tea Party types and I don't think any of them are really spoiling for a peoples' revolution. I think most would just like to see honesty and restraint in our government.

It's kind of funny -- we have one of the most leftist presidents and lawless administrations in the history of the republic, and it only makes the leftist posters at the Guardian want to tear the system down even more.

Update: Hell just froze over. I find myself in the position of agreeing with Al Gore about something:

Former vice president Al Gore called the order “obscenely outrageous.” In a tweet posted Wednesday night, he said: “In digital era, privacy must be a priority. Is it just me, or is secret blanket surveillance obscenely outrageous?”

I think it's possible that the folks who said they'd vote for Obama rather than vote for a RINO like McCain or Romney were right -- only by giving the left what they wanted could the fruits of this path really come out. Republicans and Democrats have been equally culpable, but only by preventing the left from being able to hide behind the charge of "It's the evil Republicans' fault!" Can we bring this out in the open and possibly change it. It's not partisan, anymore. The left and the right are equally outraged, I think. That's good.

Will it make a difference? I hope so.