Back on-topic:

I lived in West Berlin in the ’80s, before the fall of the Wall, as a US contractor employee. We were all VERY aware that the NSA was regularly monitoring calls in and out of Berlin, listening for key phrases.

And I encountered no one who was surprised or distressed at this idea.

I also interacted frequently with the folks who operated the only NATO listening post that was INSIDE an Iron Curtain country, at Teufelsburg. They worked 12-plus hour shifts, listening to mostly static in case something more substantial emerged. (Hardest-drinking group of folks I ever met. ATCs were next, but that’s another tale…)

This was life during the Cold War. We all took it in stride, and were grateful someone was watching this stuff. I still am, but — fwiw — I have always thought that the Patriot Act was an insane, half-assed overreaction with far too little resistance up front, and too little accountability on the back.

That didn’t make me many friends post-9/11, lemme tell ya. (My regular assertion that folks who allowed their US flags flying from their cars to get ratty and filthy were showing disrespect, not patriotism, also didn’t go over well. )

But my point is that this is NOTHING NEW. More sweeping, perhaps, but not new.