Who Are We, After All?

The Ed Snowdon case provides a fascinating turn in contemporary history. We all live in a different nation now than we did a year ago!  Now, while we are all sorting out the blame, we have to come to terms with the stunning fact that we live in a police state. Now what? Are we going to dismantle it and try to swim back toward a representative democracy or are we going to put lipstick on the monster and call it good?

With the blossoming of the idea and fact of the internet maybe it was inevitable that it would be subject to hijacking by some unscrupulous monster at some point. Turns out that demon was a shadow element of our own rogue government. But beside the identity of the monster, the astonishing scope of its activity continues to amaze and horrify us.

Wrangling about what Snowdon did and what he deserves amounts to a convenient and tragic attempt to avoid the question that we in truth cannot escape. Snowden revealed things that we never wanted to know about our nation and how that reflects on ourselves as a people. But knowing them, will we choose to fudge? The more we wallow in reflections about the man, the more we postpone the real questions, which are: WHO ARE WE and WHO WILL WE BECOME?