PRISM

[BigV]

People give UNinformed consent all the time.

eta: We all give incompletely informed consent, all the time. There are vanishingly few circumstances where our consent is required and where we know all the information. But often, we can know enough.

I think in a case like what we're seeing and hearing about Snowden, I don't know what agreement he'd signed, I imagine he probably violated the letter of such an agreement. I don't have the actual evidence, so I don't know, just speculating here. I also don't know what he's revealed, but what I've read indicates that he's revealed the existence of programs and behavior, but none of the content. Perhaps he's gone as far as confirming what some parties suspected. I don't know if that's a crime, and I'm not even sure what he's done is wrong or important. If it is as serious as some folks are saying, then I would seriously question the organizations and policies that led to such a "damaging" act. How rigorously are these people who have access to such sensitive material vetted? I know we're in a time where more and more and more and more information is redacted or withdrawn or on a need to know basis--this movement troubles me.

I do agree with regular.joe that there *IS* a legitimate need for state secrets. But it is not a need without limits or oversight. All things done in secret I believe inevitably leads to corruption and failure. I'd like to reach other limits before my state faces corruption or failure.