The Secret Sharer

Judging from the article, it sounds like the NSA has a complete searchable copy of every email sent by every American in the last decade, along with a (completely illegal) surveillance file on every single one of us. If true, it makes Drake's assessment (“This is too serious not to talk about”) the mother of all understatements.

So hats off to the New Yorker in general, and Jane Mayer in particular. Given the monstrous scale of the lawlessness she's alleging, and the catastrophic failure of governance needed to sustain it, firing a shot this public and well-timed was exceptionally brave. Unlike Drake - who seems to have seriously underestimated the response he'd trigger - the authors of this piece must recognize that they're making themselves the targets of a seriously scary bunch of people.

And yes, this (alleged) embrace of domestic spying does make the Nixon Administration "look like pikers.” It also adds plenty of weight to Evgeny Morozov's contemptuous dismissal of "utopians" who consider the internet an unalloyed force for democracy and freedom.