[liberationtech] Why we can't go back to business as usual post-PRISM.

[timothy holmes]

I don't know who you are or what work you do; perhaps it is the greatest
work ever done in law and the digital age.

You were linked on Hacker
News<https://mailman.stanford.edu/pipermail/liberationtech/2013-June/008839.html>,
so I will assume what you are concerned with is important. There is an
aspect of this story worth mentioning.

It is how *little* power the government has used to protect and provide for
the poor and disadvantaged.

 And just when the economy was improving, just when health care for all
could be possible, just when the *evidence* that government

could work not just for the privileged, this  story, important in it's own
right, has the potential to undermine this progress.

Government has to begin to work for the collective good of the people and
not be exploited by private interests.

 Yes. We need to protect the people from abusive government power. But it
is as much of a problem of how

private interests, through law and economics, limit the  governments power
to achieve a public good.

Health care, education, infrastructure, and jobs, are some of the areas
that increased, not less, government power could be effectively

utilized. I worry that governments ability to work for our common good, is
going to be undermined through recent news. I hope all will keep in mind

the richness and complexity of the issues at hand.

Thanks.
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