Force.

Editor,

In the antebellum South slaves were not allowed to congregate in groups larger than two. Experts on how slaves were treated can tell you about other such restrictions, but the point is that slave owners, meaning whites, so feared rebellion by their slaves that they went to extraordinary lengths to prevent it.

Now let's look at the neofeudal USA, where corporate fiefdoms write their own rules --- and eliminate recourse to constitutional law in contracts anyone working for or doing business with them has to sign. Again a list: Banks, high-rolling Wall Street gamblers, employers who pay minimum wage and foist the cost of their employees' benefits on working class taxpayers. I can't list everything, only what comes to mind the list of outrages, scams, and injustices is so long --- without even mentioning egregious violations of domestic and international laws by the U.S. military.

So who do you think surveilling the American public is intended to protect?

The rich are never going to give an inch, and the quintessential U.S. response to protests of injustice is? "Force."

These spying programs are designed to disrupt plans for, prevent, and retaliate against imagined violent attacks on the ruling class by the ripped-off American public, attacks that no one is contemplating, just like during slavery.

Re: "Court Rulings Blur the Line Between a Spy and a Leaker" (8/3/2013)