[KallDrexx]

> Members of our government are so indoctrinated about stopping "terrorism" that they have lost all sense of perspective. Terrorism is a political word to describe political enemies of the state, yet the patriot act and surveillance machinery has been used in enforcement of many other kinds of (less serious) crime.

You are looking at the problem wrong. It has nothing to do with government indoctrination but an issue with incentives. The FBI's whole job is to investigate potentially illegal acts and as human beings they are incentivized to do their job as well as they can. When the opportunity comes up to give them more tools to do their job no one in the FBI is going to say "no I want to continue with one hand behind my back".

The exact same thing happens at companies. Companies with poorly aligned incentives will quickly see employees act against the will of the company as a whole to make sure they look and come across as best as possible, and any chance a decision comes up to help them do their job better they will fight for it, because not doing so is pretty dumb.

Well run companies work around these incentive issues by trying to get everyone aligned with checks and balances. We don't have that in the government because the people who are supposed to be doing the checks and balances (congress) have incentives to follow the FBI's requests because of the political suicide of coming out against solving crimes and defeating terrorists. It can (and will) be used against them at election time and their checks and balances (us as voters) fall for it all the time because we (as a collective whole) are short sighted and scared that something might happen and don't want to be someone who voted for someone soft on security.

The only way to realign the incentives back for societal good is to get the common voter to understand the bigger implications of issues and hold our elected officals accountable. Until that happens the incentiives are always going to be aligned for the government to gain power.

[ctchocula]

I was with you until "It can (and will) be used against them at election time and their checks and balances (us as voters) fall for it all the time because we (as a collective whole) are short sighted and scared that something might happen and don't want to be someone who voted for someone soft on security."

Everyone's vote is secret, so no one will come to your house and bust your balls over voting for someone who comes out against defeating terrorists. The problem is that there are no incentives to become well-read in the issues behind each election. Maybe we can find a way to incentivize learning the facts and becoming well-read on issues before elections [1]

[1] http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/06/17/political-vi...

[TeMPOraL]

Individual voters are influenced by media. Publishers look hard for any story they can spin into public outrage; it's natural for politicians not to want to be a hero of such story, because it will cost them votes.

[Sacho]

They're also influenced by education. There's nothing to suggest that education is less subversive to your individual thoughts and preferences than "media", except the media you consume is largely voluntary, while education is forced upon you while you are a minor.