The impact may not be much though. People have wasted much time, money and effort on endeavors based on faulty premises just because they never took the time to evaluate their situation.
At a guess, it is a measurement tool for analysing cause and effect with the aim of not being caught out by political mass movements. If you want to model a society thermodynamically, you need a lot of data. But then I have always been a fan of Asimov's Foundation.
> It obviously has some impact somewhere, otherwise nobody would lose time creating it.
Its impact is in the government's ability to rule people by fear, once they decide to flip the switch of outright totalitarianism. That's the real purpose of the all-encompassing surveillance. It's not about catching "terrorists", it's about keeping the general populace in check.
> That's the real purpose of the all-encompassing surveillance.
That may be the eventual place that it ends up, but the road to hell is easily paved with good intentions. Statements like yours make it sound like you're about to break out into tales of the Illuminati (or whatever secret society you choose) and their designs to rule the world that stretch back to Medieval times.
Do you really believe that (e.g.) President Obama says, "Let me implement this, so that we may control the general populace through fear?" Or maybe could it be that those with the responsibility to protect (e.g.) their country are drunk on the information that the fire hose provides, and fear what tidbit of info they might miss if it is turned off?
> Statements like yours make it sound like you're about to break out into tales of the Illuminati (or whatever secret society you choose) and their designs to rule the world that stretch back to Medieval times.
Unfortunately I can't do that, since I don't know what they're up to :p
> Do you really believe that (e.g.) President Obama says, "Let me implement this, so that we may control the general populace through fear?"
You want to hear a "no", yes? :p But let's consider another question: Is whatever the NSA is doing up to Obama personally? Did Obama order the NSA to surveil the whole world? -Doubtful, especially since it started before his first term.
> Or maybe could it be that those with the responsibility to protect (e.g.) their country
Responsibility, you say? Tell me, who exactly are they responsible to, for anything they do? -You? What power do you personally hold over the NSA? -What about any other ordinary person?
Furthermore, if you're talking about the NSA protecting the country, how many other countries would be foolish enough to attack the world's prevalent Empire with the most massive army in the history of the world? Do you think the "protection" the all-encompassing surveillance (directed at the masses of ordinary people) is necessary?
> But let's consider another question: Is whatever the NSA is doing up to Obama personally?
Maybe I should have said <insert Leader or Beaurocrat here>. My point is that there is no single person at the helm twirling their mustache and laughing as their plan comes to fruition. If allowed to exist, the surveillance state will be put to use by malicious people (perhaps even a dictatorship / police state), but it's doubtful that it's part of some grand design by a single person (or group) to bring about Fascism in America.
> how many other countries
Terrorists[1] are country-less. They do exist, regardless of whether or not the US reaction to 9/11 is/was an over-reaction.
> Responsibility, you say?
There is no doubt that the people that make up the NSA, and the US military feel that their job is to protect America. That is the 'responsibility' in the same way that one would have a 'responsibility' to raise their offspring in the absence of a government to punish them if they didn't.
That said, I'm not an apologist for the abuses going on here. I'm just not on-board with the idea that the NSA consists of 100% malicious people doing malicious things all day long, while reveling in their malicious maliciousness... savvy?
> Do you think the "protection" the all-encompassing surveillance (directed at the masses of ordinary people) is necessary?
I do not. It's also seeming more and more like the NSA has been engaging in industrial espionage against civilian business to promote / protect US businesses. Which is definitely outside of their purview.
[1] I mean 'terrorist' in the conventional sense, not in the 'anyone that upsets the status quo' sense.
I do not share your view - I believe the NSA, and the rest of the spooky world of the US Government, is in fact staffed by people who have nefarious intentions - even if those intentions are 'to have a better security clearance than my neighbor' or to .. 'know best about the world than anyone else' .. or, how about .. 'to not let anyone else in the world develop technology that might upset the current power structures'.
> My point is that there is no single person at the helm twirling their mustache and laughing as their plan comes to fruition
That's all well and good, but you're arguing against a claim I didn't make.
> If allowed to exist, the surveillance state will be put to use by malicious people (perhaps even a dictatorship / police state), but it's doubtful that it's part of some grand design by a single person (or group) to bring about Fascism in America.
I do claim, though, that there is a group of people with an intent at least roughly similar to that. Obviously, I can't prove that claim to you, but we can certainly make observations about what's going on and conclusions based on them.
If you look at history, you can see that there is essentially a blueprint for turning an open society into a dictatorship. That blueprint has been used again and again in more and less bloody, more and less terrifying ways. But it is always effective.
> There is no doubt that the people that make up the NSA, and the US military feel that their job is to protect America.
Sure, there are lots of people in there with good intentions. That doesn't change anything about what's going on overall, and why.
It obviously has some impact somewhere, otherwise nobody would lose time creating it.