EXACTLY!

So much for network neutrality. The NSA has put paid to that dream.

Allow me to take this just a small step further. What good has the NSA spying been in preventing any mass shooting attacks on Americans?

Tell me about how the NSA prevented mass killings (of 4 or more people) in Sandy Hook, New York, Paris(TX), Tulsa, Callison, Terrell, Phoenix, Rice, Washington DC, Dallas, Clarksberg, Santa Monica, etc, etc, etc?

Please don't tell me that NSA spying is a matter of definition. Mass death is mass death, regardless of country of origin, skin color, or religious bent.

I can't imagine how (some? many?) Americans take a face value any comment that says NSA spying will prevent attacks on Americans when it was not needed in 2001. There was plenty of clear intelligence information leading up to the events of 9/11. No vast spying on Americans was needed to warn the Bush administration that something big was about to happen.

"Here is a representative sampling of the CIA threat reporting that was distributed to Bush administration officials during the spring and summer of 2001:

-- CIA, "Bin Ladin Planning Multiple Operations," April 20
-- CIA, "Bin Ladin Attacks May Be Imminent," June 23
-- CIA, "Planning for Bin Ladin Attacks Continues, Despite Delays," July 2
-- CIA, "Threat of Impending al Qaeda Attack to Continue Indefinitely," August 3

The failure to respond adequately to these warnings was a policy failure by the Bush administration, not an intelligence failure by the U.S. intelligence community..."

It makes me wonder why the NSA is pushing so hard to keep unconstitutional spying programs in place. What are they really doing? What are they needing to justify? What snake-oil are they trying to sell the American people? What are they really afraid of? Who are they attempting to control?

It's almost too good to be true. Yet it doesn't prevent me from hoping it's absolutely true!

How can I count the many ways that this is so, so wrong? I know a lot of Americans who feel this way, but it seems to fail to meet the facts as we know them.

There was clear warning. Wire tapping was more than sufficient.

...the intelligence community provided repeated strategic warning in the summer of 9/11 that al Qaeda was planning a large-scale attacks on American interests.

Here is a representative sampling of the CIA threat reporting that was distributed to Bush administration officials during the spring and summer of 2001:

-- CIA, "Bin Ladin Planning Multiple Operations," April 20
-- CIA, "Bin Ladin Attacks May Be Imminent," June 23
-- CIA, "Planning for Bin Ladin Attacks Continues, Despite Delays," July 2
-- CIA, "Threat of Impending al Qaeda Attack to Continue Indefinitely," August 3

The failure to respond adequately to these warnings was a policy failure by the Bush administration, not an intelligence failure by the U.S. intelligence community.

Well said, sir.

So... what to do? To me it's either stand up and fight or leave the country for greater freedoms elsewhere. Yes, Martha, they do exist (greater freedoms, that is) outside the USofA and it might be worth seeking out... It's certainly on my short list of things to consider. Leaving. Amerika. Forever.

Exactly! The USA is no longer the country I grew up in, that's for certain. I can honestly say I don't like what it's become.

I hate to admit it, but you're right. We are cowards. Maybe it's because we feel we have too much to loose? For whatever reason, we seem to tolerate the inequities and injustices quite nicely.

Noam Chomsky noted in a lecture I heard him give a few years ago that it's only in America that people ask things like "... well, what can we do?" Everywhere else he lectures, he says people come up to him and tell him what they personally are doing to combat inequity and injustice.

If Americans can personalize the injustices and inequities they face, maybe they can begin to figure out what they can do to fight back. There certainly is no incentive for US government agencies and US corporate interests to do anything but they currently are.

Um, not the way I see it.

Other than the US, there is no evidence of massive data collection activities have been conducted on the common citizens of their own citizens and foreign countries.

If you want to make an example of Europe, EU spying is more commonly directed and targeted by using human assets in narrowly focused spying operations (if you live in the US, you can find an online copy of the NSA's unclassified report on security threats that supports this statement). They do not use huge electronic vacuum cleaners to capture everything, everywhere, all the time. The US and China are the only countries with the resources to electronically gather and store data on this scale. The US for possibly dubious security reasons and China in it's state-sponsored intellectual property theft programs.

No, I think the US is pretty much alone on this one. Try living overseas for awhile and you may come to understand what I mean.

The world problem is that there may be no way to adequately defend against certain English speaking countries "Five Eyes" spying activities. If you follow overseas news you'll know that in direct response to US spy activities EU countries are carving themselves off the US-sponsored data networks. In two examples, take a look at what German and French telecos have done over the past few months.

This is an outstanding question and one I'd love to hear Americans answer.