Lately the far left, the Democrats, certain left wing celebrities, ultra liberal newspaper reporters and editors and network news reporters and commentators have been ranting and raving about how President Bush has illegally taken away our right to privacy by signing an Executive Order allowing the National Security Agency to intercept certain communications between people of interest, in the United States, and people in certain other countries. Many of the foregoing are even saying that the President should be impeached. Some are comparing him to Richard Nixon or worse.

Do these people hate President Bush so much that, they are willing to sacrifice the safety and possibly the lives of Americans, their loved ones or even themselves in an attempt to ruin the President? Are they so hungry for power that they would endanger the people of this country in order to gain a political advantage over the Republican Party? Can they be so naive as to believe that what they are doing is not potentially harmful to this country? Do they even care if they are harming this country? Do they actually believe that their right to telephone privacy is more important than our right to life? Are they dumb enough to actually believe that the President broke the law?

Personally, I don't believe that the President did anything illegal, however, if he did, then I say, thank you President Bush, for putting the lives of my loved ones before other considerations. After all, what good is privacy if you are not alive to enjoy it.

I value my privacy (I don't even like having my picture taken.), but I value the lives of my friends and loved ones more. I value my privacy (I don't even like to be in crowded places.), but I value the continued existance of this country and form of government more. I would give my life for my wife and sons. Is a possible threat to my privacy worth more than my life.

This whole brouhaha about our loss of privacy is ridiculous anyway. The odds of a N.S.A. employee or contractor listening in, on any one American's conversations, are so small as too be almost incalculable. There are, according to most calculations, in excess of six billion people on this earth. There is no way, no matter how many computers are assigned to the task, for the N.S.A. computers to check, every telephone call, fax and e:mail, for suspicious activity, therefore the computers are tasked to check only certain areas or telephone numbers. Even then they can't catch everthing. As far as I know (I don't work for the N.S.A., so I could be wrong.), unless they task the computers to check my telephone numbers or unless I use, in my conversations, certain "buzz" words that have been deemed, by people that know far more than I, to be of consequence to national security, the odds of one of my conversations being listened to are almost nill.

Say some unknown, faceless person at the N.S.A., or any other branch or part of our government, does listen to or read a transcript of one of my conversations. So what? I am not planning to do harm to this country or anyone else, I am not a terrorist nor am I a criminal. I would not know the person and he or she would not know me. I wouldn't care what that person thinks about me, so what difference would it make? Say, he or she did learn and use something of embarrassment to me, again I say so what, I'd rather be embarrassed than deny my loved ones their security.

It seems to me that the far left, most Democrats, the 'Hollywood Elite' and certain other people are always talking about rights. The problem is that, the rights that they are usually talking about are the rights of criminals, terrorists and others out to do us harm. What about our rights, our right to life, our right to protect our spouses and our children, our right to protect our property, our right to be safe, etc..

Maybe if President Clinton would have cared as much for the American people as President Bush does, a telephone conversation would have been picked up that could have saved lives by giving us the advance information that could have prevented 9/11 (Remember, the planning for 9/11 started long before President Bush took office.).

Whether or not the far left likes it, these are trying times. We are at war, a war against terrorism. During war some sacrifices have too be made. This war may well be more important than any war we have been in since the Civil War. We have given up many freedoms during each war, including the Cold War. After each war, we got those freedoms back. Have we become too lazy, too greedy, too self indulgent to give up some freedoms in order to protect our loved ones and, perhaps, win this war.

I don't know about the rest of you, maybe some of you don't care about your friends or family, maybe some of you don't have any friends or family, but I would be willing to give up whatever privacy I have, if it would help protect my family.

One last note to those on the far left and their sympathizers: Don't give me that junk about how you are trying to help Americans by stopping the erosion of our 'freedoms'. The fact is, we enjoy more 'freedoms' today than we ever have. There is no country in the world that gives it's citizens more 'freedoms' than America.

David G. Hallstrom, Sr. is a retired private investigator and currently publishes several internet directories including http://www.resourcesforattorneys.com a legal and lifestyle resources directory for attorneys, lawyers and the internet public. For more lifestyle information see http://lifestyle.resourcesforattorneys.com, the Lifestyle directory from Resources For Attorneys.

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