Privacy Becomes a Conservative Cause
Photo Credit: APAs Congress takes a closer look at Internet privacy with this week’s Federal Trade Commission oversight hearing in the House, conservatives have a unique opportunity.
Privacy used to be a dirty word among many conservatives because the liberal Warren Court of the 1960s used concepts such as “penumbras” – words not expressly found in the Constitution — to overturn state laws that protected traditional moral precepts or valid law enforcement.
In recent years, however, beginning with the passage of the USA Patriot Act during the George W. Bush years, but expanded seemingly without limit under Barack Obama, conservatives have awakened to the threat of the massive surveillance state.
Some of the leading Republican presidential prospects are taking a hatchet to the Obama administration over the scandal. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has introduced a bill to rein in the National Security Agency’s sweeping powers, and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) recently knocked President Obama for allowing an “unprecedented and intrusive surveillance system” to take hold, eroding Americans’ privacy rights.
House conservatives have joined the fight, too. An amendment to shut down the NSA’s sweeping Internet and phone data collection programs sponsored by Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) was narrowly defeated after leadership stepped in to vote it down. And just recently, Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R.-Tenn.), a Tea Party favorite, resumed a series of briefings focused on the growing threats to privacy and the collection of personal data.
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