Security? Bah.

Why do governments think that they need to protect their citizens by stealing sensitive information about them when it's already been proven that governments are notoriously bad about keeping and using that information appropriately? Need I remind everyone of the times, yes, that's plural, and within the span of a week, intelligence documents were left on a train? [For details see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7449255.stm] Forgotten, like an umbrella. I guess in the states that shouldn't be a problem, since civil servants don't take public transport here. The Patriot Act is the singlemost irresponsibly invasive bunch of tripe of a law ever. For those who argue 'only the guilty need fear the information collected', I say Bah! Humbug! Don't we live in the Age of Identity Theft? Some criminal, or terrorist for that matter, could use the 'innocuous' information collected and lost to impersonate me, thereby making me guilty of all the things they commit in my name. See, the Patriot Act does what the TSA does with all their new regulations: make the terrorists smarter. The harder something is to make happen, the smarter the person who eventually makes it happen. And meanwhile, your average civilian suffers horrible inconveniences and possible recriminations due to illkept data.