Police State

Rand Paul files class action suit against NSA.

Clapper says terrorism is only the fourth greatest threat to US.

"In this year’s testimony, however, the real news was that Clapper undermined his own argument that Snowden’s alleged help to terrorist organizations was so horrific for the country; he did this by saying that international terrorism was only the fourth worst threat to the nation. That’s right, Clapper claimed that whistleblowing insiders, such as Snowden, and foreign intelligence services were bigger threats to the nation than were terrorists. And for the second year in a row, he cited cyber attacks by Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea on US defense contractors, financial institutions, water utilities, and electrical grids as the number one threat. So after all the hysteria after the 9/11 attacks, drone wars in several developing countries, and two overseas quagmires in Iraq and Afghanistan, which allegedly attempted to "drain the swamp" of terrorists, the terrorist threat has been downgraded."

Our police state is making stealing money and oppressing American, not keeping us safe. As for war:

"In at least Iraq and Yemen (a major venue for the US drone war), hard data indicate that US military action has actually increased the numbers of Islamist terrorists. Data don’t lie, because what drives radical Islamists to attack the United States is unnecessary US meddling in Muslim countries – just look at the late Osama bin Laden’s writings. And since the chance that international terrorists will kill any American is about the same as an asteroid killing him or her (and the chance of succumbing to such a terrorist is less than being struck by lightning), the US government has long overinvested in the military means to fight terrorists."

Nobody would advocate spending $500 billion a year protecting people from lightning strikes.

Government secrecy caused a seven year delay in overturning a simple error putting someone of the no-fly list.