[bigralph]

Originally Posted by The_Blur

While many of us are not worried, it is worth pointing out that history maintains a trend of punishing people for nothing at all. We punished witches at Salem and communists in Congress, even though McCarthy knew that they were just opponents to his own success.

This is an opportunity for the government to have unnecessary information. This information is saved on high-tech computers that we paid for the government to keep and run by employees who receive pay from tax dollars. I'd rather that money go to a poor school district or to disaster relief than someone who can easily clip a recording to make a good American look bad.

I love my country. I want it to stay free and brave. For it to be free, liberties cannot be steamrolled. For it to be brave, we must all have the capacity to say what we want, do what we want, and live how we want.

We shouldn't have to worry about the words we say being placed in an order that incriminates us to someone who might benefit from our punishment.

It's not paranoia. The recordings are real. We're now waiting for someone to capitalize from someone's "un-American" conversation, even though it is "American" to say what we want in a place that grants to right to speak freely. There is no guarantee that we won't be punished for such statements, especially if they are true.

Contact your elected officials to discuss your freedom of speech. Tell them how you love your country, but you know that our nation's founders are rolling in their graves knowing that government has this sort of power over Americans.

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