> "After all, there are so many more harder and pressing problems in the world. Global Warming, Child Slavery, Drugs, overpriced health care, mortgage and educa

> "After all, there are so many more harder and pressing problems in the world. Global Warming, Child Slavery, Drugs, overpriced health care, mortgage and education loans?" What do these problems have in common? That's right, every single one is a produce of extreme imbalances in power. Every. Single. One. And what does a program like PRISM undermine? Exactly, the democratic structures that can successfully challenge an abusive status quo. Larry Lessig is fond of pointing out that his chosen problem (campaign finance) may not be the biggest problem in the world, or the most serious, but it is the first in that it addresses a fundamental dysfunction that prevents the us from responding to a constellation of concerns in a meaningful, socially beneficial way. The development of a authoritarian surveillance state falls into a similar category, in that its mere existence frustrates a broad range of social development goals. Because it is absolutely guaranteed to be used against civilians who are attempting to steer government state power towards healthy ends, and away from abusive, toxic ones, it should be treats as an intrinsic part of any problem that benefits a small but entrenched status quo. Indeed, that's the whole point of structures like these. They actively undermine the ability of people to organize themselves in opposition to established interests that profit from extraordinary and otherwise unsustainable levels of abuse. And no, this isn't speculation. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/earth-insight/2013/jun/14/climate-change-energy-shocks-nsa-prism http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/earth-insight/2013/jun...