The script is nauseatingly familiar. An exceptional nation fulfilling its destiny by becoming the surveillance state. The cameras are always rolling — in the streets, where we work, in parks and playground, in every space Americans congregate for work or play. Many Americans unwittingly assist the feds by wall to wall cameras on their own property. The surveillance state has implemented a new kind of law enforcement called predictive policing — using racially biased data to target potential crime and criminals. We are a nation of spy masters and the spied upon. From the founding of the republic, the peculiar form of democracy in the Constitution turns out to have little to do with democratic guarantees of universal freedom and equality and a lot more to do with insulating the rich and privileged from the dangers of too much democracy. Surveillance is the key to that control. Since when does the unquestioned assumption of the need for security carry with it the corollary of invasion of privacy? Since the exceptional nation became the perpetual war machine with eight ongoing wars and another couple waiting in the wings. Are we on the way to fulfilling Orwell’s prophecy? Find out in “The Exceptional Nation Meets the Surveillance State”
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