the leader of a political group being blackmailed and doing what the blackmailers want, is far more harmful to that group than the potential fallout from the blackmail information being made public.

that is why, despite the damage to the movements, the information must be made public.

in order to understand what i am saying, you need to be able to quantify the harm done by three different scenarios:

1) (enslavement/possession) - the efforts of a movement being intentionally misdirected by a compromised leader
2) (beheading) - a movement being temporarily leaderless because the members want a new leader
3) (schism) - half the members of a movement being temporarily leaderless because of disagreements with the leader of the movement.

.

the first one is so harmful to a movement, that the US government specifies term limits upon the office of the president.

they willingly behead their organisation every 8 years, soely to prevent the possibility of being stuck with a leader who does not represent the people's best interests.

tl;dr - the first possibility (1) is so bad that democratic governments all over the world intentionally subject themselves to the second possibility (2) on a regular basis.

As to the Patriot Act, again I don't know everything there is to know about it and I'd have to look further into it. For now, I'll have to accept your assertion that he back flipped on that issue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BmdovYztH8

one of the most interesting things about this video is the passion in his voice when he is arguing against bush's patriot act as a senator, compared to the way he argues for it as president in the second part of the video.

P.S. - I'm not like you when you were younger landswimmer, you are misinterpreting my intentions. I used to argue for you very closely all those years ago on this forum, I agreed with almost everything you are saying now. In fact, I thought the way you trolled people was fucking awesome and I started adopting your form of sarcasm. I, quite honestly, looked up to you at that time.

i dont admire the way i used to argue. i was confrontational and dismissive, and that does not work well for discussions. it worked back then because everyone else was confrontational and dismissive. my argument tactics were powerful when it came to discrediting the opposition and getting the audience to believe i had won.

its amazingly good for silencing/discrediting the opposition, and toxic for proper discussions.

and today, those same tactics i worked out by trial and error, are used by government shills and "people who accept the official story without questioning it" to suppress dissenting opinions and discredit/attack people who complain about the NSA.

being on the receiving end of the tactics i once used has shown me why those tactics should never be used in a genuine discussion.

those tactics are a weapon which can be misused, and in order to prevent them from being misused, noone can be allowed to use them.

people must learn how to detect when they are being suppressed in a discussion, so that they can defend their credibility and opinions, and prevent the discussion from being stifled.

even when the use of those tactics is unintentional, it still has the effect of suppressing the discussion and stifling the exchange of ideas.

thats why whenever i see someone using those tactics used in a discussion, it immediately makes me think that the person who used them is an asshole who has no interest in changing their opinion.

I don't hold the same views anymore however, so even though I agree with the way you argue, I don't exactly agree with a lot of the things you say. Instead of dismissing you entirely I instead choose to have a debate with you, mostly because I figured it would be interesting to be on the other side of an issue.

I don't know why you feel I'm being an asshole, and I honestly don't care. Just because I attack an argument you made directly and look at its literal meaning (I.E. the way you typed and phrased it) doesn't mean I don't care about the discussion. I'm a stickler for details, and that's just how I am.

After you reexplained what you meant, I understood exactly what you were saying. In the context in which you are making your argument, your demand makes perfect sense.

thats good, i'm glad we kept at this long enough to reach an understanding.

this may seem strange after having put in so much effort to change your mind, but i should warn you against discussing the NSA in a negative light using your main accounts on any websites you use.

shilling operations target people who express opinions they dont like. if you catch the attention of a shill you could find your username on a list, and if you make it onto one of these lists they will use multiple accounts to try and discredit every on-topic post you make. you will be profiled based on your post history, and if they find a tactic which works against you, they'll use it.

i made it onto one of these lists not long ago, it was interesting to say the least...