Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Why Polls Don't Matter

The Blog | Arianna Huffington: What Do Americans Really Think of Bush's "Caller ID-to-the-Billionth-Power" Program? (And Why It Doesn't Matter) | The Huffington Post:

"Of course, the larger point is that even if we knew with absolute certainty that -- with a margin of error of zero -- 63 percent or 73 percent or 93 percent or 103 percent of the American people were cool with the NSA keeping a permanent record of every single phone call made by every single American -- that still doesn't make it okay. Or legal.

Billmon nailed it: 'The whole point of having civil liberties is that they are not supposed to be subject to a majority veto.'

People can pick up their phones and vote Chris Daughtry off American Idol (and keep in mind, all you Katharine McPhee fans, the NSA has a record of who you are too). But they can't pick up the phone and vote off the Fourth Amendment. At least, not yet.

However the American people really feel about the NSA program -- and as more and more details come out, I have little doubt people will feel more and more uncomfortable with the idea of Big Brother having a record of who they called, when they called them, and how long the calls lasted -- this is most assuredly not a question of popular or unpopular. It's a question of legal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional. . ."

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