Latter Day Sinner

I’ve been thinking about the intersection between the US surveillance state and local surveillance. It is easy to ask questions about how much someone local is able get away with on probation. It’s harder and much more deeply personal to ask how much surveillance we will permit. When a person skirts the law and we clamor for the “bad guys” to watched more thoroughly, we invite the police, federal agents and bureaucrats to watch us all. That is the number one lesson of The Patriot Act. The federal government surveils us all in the name of surveilling terrorists. The powers to watch criminals inevitably become powers to watch everyone and make ordinary citizens into criminals in the process.