Are We Safer Yet?

I wouldn't find the administration's assurances about how "targeted" the NSA program is quite so laughable if I didn't keep coming across stories like this one.

The ACLU of Georgia released copies of government files on Wednesday that illustrate the extent to which the FBI, the DeKalb County Division of Homeland Security and other government agencies have gone to compile information on Georgians suspected of being threats simply for expressing controversial opinions.

Two documents relating to anti-war and anti-government protests, and a vegan rally, prove the agencies have been "spying" on Georgia residents unconstitutionally, the ACLU said.

For example, more than two dozen government surveillance photographs show 22-year-old Caitlin Childs of Atlanta, a strict vegetarian, and other vegans picketing against meat eating, in December 2003. They staged their protest outside a HoneyBaked Ham store on Buford Highway in DeKalb County.

An undercover DeKalb County Homeland Security detective was assigned to conduct surveillance of the protest and the protestors, and take the photographs. The detective arrested Childs and another protester after he saw Childs approach him and write down, on a piece of paper, the license plate number of his unmarked government car.

"They told me if I didn't give over the piece of paper I would go to jail and I refused and I went to jail, and the piece of paper was taken away from me at the jail and the officer who transferred me said that was why I was arrested," Childs said on Wednesday.

I realize that Muslims have dietary laws, but I really doubt Osama has been biding his time waiting to attack a HoneyBaked Ham store in DeKalb County.

See, when the government is already in the business of harassing legitimate protests, and arresting people for having the temerity to write down the clearly visible license number of the car being used to harass them, I get pretty uncomfortable about them having even more power. If they're taking pictures of ham protests, and arresting people because they don't want them knowing the license number of a car that has its license plates in plain view, why should I believe their protestations about who they wiretap and why?