Quote (WidowMaKer_MK @ Jun 7 2013 06:37am)
...the PRISM program is the name given to the NSA monitoring of internet activity for the purpose of national security . As someone who always assumed the government would monitor the webs from day one and who also recognizes that planned terrorist attacks against the homeland have been averted I am not concerned in the least that the program exists ; in fact I support it . My real concern is who is leaking these top secret activities to the media and are we actively investigating this breach of of their confidentiality agreements and thereby alerting future attackers of an important tool we use to intercept their communications . Whoever is doing the leaking should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law .
You don't seem to consider the other end of the spectrum, where people and the government is far from perfect and is fully capable of abusing power and committing crimes against the people. You have to be cautious about certain steps government takes, its easier to keep up than to catch up...and if the government gets too out of control it can reach a state of no return; and a revolution would be necessary.
The way I see it is Prism is a core mechanism for having control over the people. It can be a means to get eyes everywhere, and can someday be used to suppress organized efforts to fight back against the government when it is getting out of hand...You're setup for tyranny.
I acknowledge your reasoning that it would be an effective anti-terrorism, but you have to do some cost-benefit analysis here....Is the risk of tyranny or the risk of a 3rd party hacking our prism system worth it?
On a side note, you don't need a system like prism to catch almost all terrorists. Terrorists are generally less intelligent and clouded by extremist hate.