On Tue, Jun 11, 2013 at 7:50 AM, Marv Gandall <marvgand2 at gmail.com> wrote:
> (Especially when it's your party which is in power)
>
> Most Americans back NSA tracking phone records, prioritize probes over
> privacy
> By Jon Cohen
> Washington Post
> June 10 2013
>
> A large majority of Americans say the federal government should focus on
> investigating possible terrorist threats even if personal privacy is
> compromised, and most support the blanket tracking of telephone records in
> an effort to uncover terrorist activity, according to a new Washington
> Post-Pew Research Center poll.
>
> Fully 45 percent of all Americans say the government should be able to go
> further than it is, saying that it should be able to monitor everyone’s
> online activity if doing so would prevent terrorist attacks. A slender
> majority, 52 percent, say no such broad-based monitoring should occur.
>
> The new survey comes amid recent revelations of the National Security
> Agency’s extensive collection of telecommunications data to facilitate
> terrorism investigations.
>
> Overall, 56 percent of Americans consider the NSA’s accessing of telephone
> call records of millions of Americans through secret court orders
> “acceptable,” while 41 percent call the practice “unacceptable.” In 2006,
> when news broke of the NSA’s monitoring of telephone and e-mail
> communications without court approval, there was a closer divide on the
> practice — 51 percent to 47 percent.
>
> General priorities also are similar to what they were in 2006: Sixty-two
> percent of Americans now say it’s more important for the government to
> investigate terrorist threats, even if those investigations intrude on
> personal privacy, while 34 percent say privacy should be the focus,
> regardless of the effect on such investigations.
>
> But with a Democratic president at the helm instead of a Republican,
> partisan views have turned around significantly.
>
> Sixty-nine percent of Democrats say terrorism investigations, not privacy,
> should be the government’s main concern, an 18-percentage-point jump from
> early January 2006, when the NSA activity under the George W. Bush
> administration was first reported. Compared with that time, Republicans’
> focus on privacy has increased 22 points.
>
> The reversal on the NSA’s practices is even more dramatic. In early 2006,
> 37 percent of Democrats found the agency’s activities acceptable; now
> nearly twice that number — 64 percent — say the use of telephone records is
> okay. By contrast, Republicans slumped from 75 percent acceptable to 52
> percent today.
>
> Compared with a 2002 Pew poll, Democrats are now 12 percentage points more
> apt to support the government’s monitoring of all e-mails and other online
> activity if officials say that it might help prevent terrorist attacks. On
> the flip side, the number of Republicans who say the government should not
> do this has increased by 13 points.
>
> The poll was conducted Thursday through Sunday among a random national
> sample of 1,004 adults. Results from the full poll have a margin of
> sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. The question on
> monitoring everyone’s online activity was asked starting Friday; results
> from that question have a 4.5-point error margin.
>
> Cohen is polling director for Capital Insight, Washington Post Media’s
> independent polling group. Capital Insight pollsters Peyton M. Craighill
> and Scott Clement contributed to this report.
>
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/most-americans-support-nsa-tracking-phone-records-prioritize-investigations-over-privacy/2013/06/10/51e721d6-d204-11e2-9f1a-1a7cdee20287_story.html?tid=pm_politics_pop
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