Is Our Government Heading in the Wrong Direction?

There have been a lot of articles in the news lately about various acts our government is involved in that paint it in an unflattering light. The latest article I just read is what made me decide to write up a little blog entry about this. When I was growing up back in the '80s and early '90s, the soviet union was the enemy and we were always told how evil the communist governments were. We are told of all the lack of freedoms these people have to live with. We were told of all the evil things the communist governments did to their people. Now I'm no conspiracy theorist, but all the headlines lately have me wondering what the hell is going on with our own country.

The latest article is titled "U.S. Is Secretly Collecting Records of Verizon Calls". It goes on to state how the government is secretly carrying out a domestic surveillance program which collects communication records and data of thousands upon thousands of Americans. Apparently there is no regard to customer privacy as Verizon has just handed over everything asked for to the NSA.

We also saw in the headlines about how the I.R.S. targeting of conservative political groups. If groups included the words "tea party" or "patriot", they were additionally scrutinized. Believe me, I'm not a conservative nut or a left wing liberal. It amazes me that this government organization which should be neutral and focused on collecting taxes, was actually taking aim on conservative groups.

I was also shocked to find out that our government wiretapped the AP (Associated Press) in a witch hunt to find out information on a leaked story. There is much more going on such as indefinite detention and warrant-less searches, but I'm not going to keep going on and on about all this. The fact is that after the 9/11 attacks, everyone was scared and gave up a lot of their freedoms in hopes of better security. Now we are paying the price for it and it scares me a little. America likes to pass judgment on other countries when it comes to freedoms, but I think we need to spend a little more time focusing on ourselves for a while. Soon we will be no better off than those evil communist countries I grew up fearing.

It also reminded me of our old HHD commander's outgoing speech. Most of it was the normal fond memories and thank you to various folks, but at the end he reminded all the soldiers in the audience what we all swore to do "support and defend the constitution of the United States". He warned that we may be asked or commanded to do things that violate this oath by our superiors, but always remember the oath we took. It was a little strange at the time, but now I'm wondering what kind of future he saw coming.

You can check out the following articles I read before writing about this:


U.S. Is Secretly Collecting Records of Verizon Calls
IRS Apologizes for Targeting Tea Party Groups
AP Wiretap Assaults Core Values
10 Reasons The U.S. is No Longer the Land of the Free