Liberty v. Safety

In a country where over 400,000 die annually from tobacco related causes, over 30,000 from firearms, and 0 from foreign launched terrorist attacks, we Americans appear to have our priorities seriously out of whack. How can we justify ripping apart our Constitutional freedoms to privacy and free speech to combat a "threat" which is virtually non-existent in the real world? Edward Snowden is not a hero- but he certainly is not a traitor. What he has done is to expose the hypocrisy that exists at the highest levels of government where elected and appointed officials pretend that foreign based terrorists are so dangerous that not even members of Congress- let alone ordinary American citizens- are allowed to know what our government is doing to us in the name of protecting us. We need Congress to enact legislation to protect both whistleblowers and our privacy, and instead of criminalizing the actions of citizens who reveal wrongdoing, we need to prosecute the people who knowingly violate our Constitutional rights. As Benjamin Franklin said: "Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.