Given the police officers and law enforcement agencies are just as bad as the NSA in many jurisdictions, I'm not sure I see the difference.
Ever heard of civil forfeiture or someone's camera getting 'broken' after being seized for taking pictures?
It is more important the rights of the innocent are protected than the law enforcement system be enabled to catch the guilty.
Do realize I say this as someone who has had his home broken into with him in it and the guy was never caught. I've had family members who were robbed and no one was caught either. The cops responses was basically "Eh, we can't take the time to look for your $X,XXX worth of property" essentially and you didn't end up in the hospital.
The NSA doesn't shoot black teenagers in the back, so I'd say they compare quite well to the police.
9% of homicides in Nevada are police shootings. We don't have figures for the most of the US because law enforcement agencies refuse to provide them. (This is illegal, but because congress did not provide for enforcement, it just goes on.)
"An anonymous former drone operator for Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) told The Intercept — a new publication helmed by Glenn Greenwald, who broke the first of many NSA revelations last year — that the US military and CIA use the NSA's metadata analysis and phone-tracking abilities to identify airstrike targets without confirming their veracity on the ground. The claims were corroborated by documents provided by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden."
Eh? You sure the NSA doesn't help provide targeting data?
Ever heard of civil forfeiture or someone's camera getting 'broken' after being seized for taking pictures?
It is more important the rights of the innocent are protected than the law enforcement system be enabled to catch the guilty.
Do realize I say this as someone who has had his home broken into with him in it and the guy was never caught. I've had family members who were robbed and no one was caught either. The cops responses was basically "Eh, we can't take the time to look for your $X,XXX worth of property" essentially and you didn't end up in the hospital.