Here’s What Will Happen As a Result of the NSA Scandal

Absolutely nothing. We are getting upset about the government reading our emails and listening to our calls. However, for the last 12 years, the government has been engaging in a campaign of detentions, torture and killings on the basis of little else than a few legal memos.

History tells us that when the government does shady and horrible stuff on our behalf, we tend to get used to it.

Don’t get me wrong, I think this kind of broad-based surveillance and the secrecy surrounding it are absolutely outrageous. But the more I think about it the more I feel like absolutely nothing will come out of our outrage. The same way we turn a blind eye to innocent people getting tortured and killed outside of the legal system in the name of our security, we will get used to getting spied on by the government. And in fact, it seems like we already have.

As a bit of an ironic cherry on top of this cynical cake, I can already see a presidential candidate in 2016 running on the platform of abolishing all this wiretapping, only to do a 180 once in office (the same way Obama did regarding Bush’s transgressions). History loves to repeat itself.