President Barack Obama wants to have a national debate on the balance of privacy and security. I agree. We should have that debate. My only problem, however, is that we should have had that debate in 2001.
After the 9/11 attacks in 2001, most Americans wanted President George W. Bush to do whatever was necessary to prevent additional attacks. He listened to our concerns and so did Congress. As a result, in October 2001 Congress wrote and overwhelmingly approved the Patriot Act, which gave our government broad powers to spy on Americans at home and in the work place.
If anyone was communicating with terrorists, our government wanted to know. Americans not only wanted our government to know, they expected our government to know. And so we gave our government broad powers to monitor our phone and email records.
For the record, only one senator, Democrat Ross Feingold, of Wisconsin, voted against the Patriot Act of 2001. Also, for the record, that vote cost Feingold his Senate seat.
We the people also looked the other way as our government arrested and confined people without due process protections. Oh, and we tortured people, too.
Basically, after 9/11, with the support and encouragement of the American people, our government put aside our nation's fundamental values for the sake of national security. We the people did not complain or question these actions. In fact, those who did question the Patriot Act, as I have noted multiple times in this column, were called unpatriotic and worse.
It is interesting to listen to some members of Congress who appear to be surprised and upset at what our government has been doing since 2001. Of course, just about all of these people voted for the Patriot Act and voted twice more for the extension of the Act in 2006 and 2011.
For the record, when the Patriot Act was extended for a second time in 2011, a majority of Republicans voted for the extension while a majority of Democrats voted against the extension.
So let's have that debate. But before we do, I would encourage everyone to go online and read the Patriot Act written by Congress. If there are parts of the Act you don't like, call your representatives in Congress. Then, after everyone understands the content of the Act, let's bring it up for a fourth vote in Congress.
Even better, let's have the American people vote on the Patriot Act. Polls show that immediately after a terrorist act or domestic bombing, a majority of Americans support domestic spying to prevent more violence. But after a few years of quiet, support for domestic spying decreases dramatically. Then, after another bombing or mass murder, support for domestic spying goes back up.
Americans want it both ways. We want our privacy and security, but we are unsure about where to draw the line in terms of giving up some privacy for the sake of security.
When Navy Seals found Osama bin Laden, they found cell phones in his home. Is it reasonable for our government to look at phone records to see if anyone has been dialing the phone numbers found on those cell phones?
This is just one example of where finding the balance between national security and privacy becomes challenging and problematic.
While we can't have it both ways, we may be able to find an acceptable balance. So let the national discussion begin, but let's be real and let's be honest.
