Yaron Brook on the NSA monitoring scandal

In response to the scandal surrounding NSA surveillance exposed by former Booz Allen contractor Edward Snowden, ARI Executive Director Yaron Brook recorded a 10-minute video that draws attention to the wider context in which these programs need to be assessed. He makes two critical points:

1)      The war we need to fight against al Qaeda and Islamic totalitarianism requires naming and targeting the enemy, defining victory, and setting a timeframe, not a massive spying dragnet on Americans.

2)      A proper government is the agent of its citizens, not the master. In its role as the agent, the default should be openness, not secrecy;  in very few contexts is it appropriate for the government to operate in secrecy. Only when the government can convince its citizens that secrecy is necessary for protecting their rights is it acceptable. With respect to the NSA surveillance programs, that burden has not been met.

Yaron Brook’s comments on the War on Terror, the Patriot Act, and NSA monitoring can be viewed by clicking on the video below:

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