I keep seeing references to "having the conversation" in various threads and yet we never really get to the conversation in a real way. We never really get to the issues except in a thread or two here and there. So let's have the conversation. Other than this intro there will be no meta llowed here. Alright, with that out of the way let's do this.
First, we need to get rid of the PATRIOT Act. That's a minimum for action in regards to legislation. We can replace it with something else down the line, to be discussed herein hopefuly, but there seems to be a pretty broad agreement that it is not appropriate now, if it ever was. I'm not sure that it is within the topic exactly, but I would add that we should also end the AUMF.
Second, we need to make public all secret laws. Secret laws are entirely unacceptable in any country that claims to be a democracy. The mere idea that a law should ever be secret is absurd and outrageous. We need to end the practice of secret laws immediately. This means that there are some court decisions which have set precedences that need to be declassified. That shouldn't be a problem for anyone if the specific details, names and places, etc. are redacted and the pertinent information is left in.
On the other side of the Fleur de Kos I'll talk about what we can do and what we already are doing.
One of the rules here at Daily Kos is that you don't out people's real identity. There are good reasons for this, specifically that some people could get in trouble for what they write here, whether they might lose their job or just lose a friend. This is part of what is called a security culture. We understand that people can be harmed by something that they write here and we have developed a culture that secures our fellow kossacks from such harm.
We can start building this sort of culture in other parts of our lives. But it will be a little work. It will require that we learn new habits that will make all our communities more private for individuals who wish to be private. One of the ways to do this is to do things that increase your own privacy, even when you don't think you need privacy. This means doing things like always encrypting your emails, even if it's just a grocery list. Or changing your settings on facebook so that facebook suggest that people tag you in a picture. This relies on facial recognition software and the more people thaqt have this feature turned off the fewer programs we have sorting through our information.
This is far from an exhaustive list of things, but I want to atually have the damn conversation so please, stick to discussing privacy and such and not which side anyone is on.