Police in the US have been drastically more militarized since 9/11/01. Also, we now live in a surveillance state to a degree inconceivable prior to the passage

Police in the US have been drastically more militarized since 9/11/01. Also, we now live in a surveillance state to a degree inconceivable prior to the passage of the PATRIOT Act, which was rammed through in the days following that event, without scrutiny or debate. We are all subjected to drastically more surveillance, and militarized policing, as a result of the events that day, even those of us lucky enough to be insulated from the direct kinetic impacts of the war we started as a result of it. To say nothing of extraordinary rendition, extrajudicial killings, and the trillions of our tax dollars wasted on a war against a regime that had nothing to do with the event itself. We could have made a much better world, for that money. edit: "We" meaning citizens of the US, although to a large degree these impacts are not only felt by US citizens.