Do I have to comment?

*sigh*

Yeh, yeh: Dog bites man and the feds “spy” on citizens’ international communications.

¡Quelle surprise!

*yawn*

I really, really did NOT want to give the latest LLMB/MMPA meme any ink (so I haven’t stated the meme-ish sound bite), but I’ve had several folks ask in email why I haven’t, so I’ll answer that here.

It’s not news. And it’s not the threat to our civil liberties that the Loony Left Moonbat Brigade and the Mass Media Podpeople’s Army would have us think. It was, as Michelle Malkin and others have pointed out, simply a means of

1. pushing the Iraq elections out of headline space
2. attempting (and apprently succeeding) to kill the Patriot Act
3. shilling (in the lead article from the New York Slimes) a book, which I’ll not give any promo by even naming here.

And James, at Upsated, has the final (well, almost 🙂 word:

“Do you think that your [sic] communication is private? Believe me when I say its [sic] not. With just a small amount of cash, I could monitor my entire town. From cellphones to hardlines, anybody with just a passing knowledge of the Telco industry could listen to everything you say. Hearing your so called private conversations is a snap.”

Yep. (And, BTW, you know that around 75% of the wireless networked computers in just about anyone’s neck of the woods are wide open to anyone who wants to browse them? People who don’t care enough about their privacy to close the doors-or at least close the curtains-shouldn’t “get frisky” on the living room floor… )

h.t. to Jo’s Cafe for the Upstated link.