Temporary Safety

All I’ve been seeing for the last few weeks, and from some folks I respect and admire, is a rant about how we must renew the Patriot Act. Fingers are pointed, accusations made and the bottom party line seems to be, “if it bugs a bunch of whiny pussies to have their civil liberties violated in order to keep our country safe and free from Islamoterrorists, then so be it.”

Then there’s usually some sort of comparison to liberals wanting to take away our freedoms being the ones to yell loudest.

Shame. Shame on you.

You are the same ones screaming bloody murder about criminals being released from jail on technicalities.

Well folks, those technicalities happen to be our United States Constitution. And any of you idiots, right or left, who think our founding fathers weren’t smart enough to foresee modern times, and that the constitution is outdated and quaint, couldn’t be more wrong.

Those technicalities are what keeps us free. They are what separates us from the rest of the world. They are in fact what makes us the most successful country on the planet.

I kind of like the “technicality” that our government can’t spy on me without clearing it with a judge first. I think it’s fitting that they can’t come into my home on a whim and snoop through my belongings. I’m pretty enamored of the idea that they can’t drag me from my home and keep me in a cell somewhere for years without charging me with a crime.

And, if some bearded idiot with a checkered do-rag commits a crime in this country because I enjoy these freedoms, so be it. When we give up our freedoms to protect ourselves from them, they win.

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin