Article Contributed on: 6/19/2009 11:29:01 AM
The United States Constitution is pretty specific on some points, e.g.:
Amendment 4 - Search and Seizure. Ratified 12/15/1791.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
This week brought revelations of government computers spying on every single email sent in the United States. This was only a "revelation" to those like your congressman who weren't paying attention earlier in the decade when the honest Adm. Poindexter of 1980's Iran Contra scandal and 2000's
Total Information Awareness notoriety announced loudly and publicly that this was in the works.
So what does it mean to be "secure" in our "papers" against "unreasonable" searches? Can it possibly constitutional for the government to monitor everything it can perceive about the individual citizen 24 hours a day? Do the words of the Constitution have any meaning in the current age?
As a lover of liberty, I like to think those magic words do still have meaning, that a right
shall not be violated, regardless of the numerous exceptions applied by the Supreme Court in recent decades under the rubric of "compelling and overriding state interest".
But in effect, the Constitution was on life support as soon as the War on Drugs got rolling, and now in the War on Terror, the Constitution may be on its deathbed. It's certainly in a coma.
As far as the United States Federal Government is concerned, the Constitution is unconstitutional, at least as long as they can keep the War on Terror going.