BerinSzoka

I will caution everyone here that what we're trying to do isn't to "stop the NSA" (a hashtag being used for this event) or "defund the NSA" (an activist website from a few months ago) in general, but to stop/defund the NSA's blanket surveillance that is not based on suspicion that particular people have a connection to a real national security threat.

That distinction is essential if we're going to succeed in actually changing surveillance. If our message is heard as simple NSA-bashing, it will be dismissed out of hand as naive.

The fact is that the NSA and other surveillance agencies DO play a vital role in protecting us from real national security threats -- just as police protect us from theft, violence etc. But to quote Ramon Vargas, the honest Mexican policeman played so brilliantly by Charlton Heston in the 1958 classic movie "Touch of Evil": "A policeman's job is only easy in a police state."

Right on!

Point is: nobody's trying to "stop" the police. Yes, we are trying to make their jobs a bit harder, but it's worth it.