Sacrificing freedom for...well, let's call them pragmatic reasons... is more than an academic conundrum.
There's practical implications as well.
The thing about the United States is that... US legitimacy stems from being right. Internationally speaking, the US is supposed to be the good guy. That's where justification to act comes from.
Now, if you start saying that...to catch the bad guys, we gotta play hardball ourselves - ie, we start throwing aside some of our own morals...
Then you lose some of your legitimacy. People are gonna look at you and think, well, aren't you going against your own principles? Aren't you being hypocritical? Why should we trust you? To an increasing degree, I think...a lot of US citizens are looking at the government that way. And, well, if you widen the scope, a lot of other countries look at the US that way as well.
There are, honestly, quite practical reasons to stay true to one's own principles. Basically, that's the course you've set yourself, and thus it becomes the standard you're judged by.
-- Acyl
There's practical implications as well.
The thing about the United States is that... US legitimacy stems from being right. Internationally speaking, the US is supposed to be the good guy. That's where justification to act comes from.
Now, if you start saying that...to catch the bad guys, we gotta play hardball ourselves - ie, we start throwing aside some of our own morals...
Then you lose some of your legitimacy. People are gonna look at you and think, well, aren't you going against your own principles? Aren't you being hypocritical? Why should we trust you? To an increasing degree, I think...a lot of US citizens are looking at the government that way. And, well, if you widen the scope, a lot of other countries look at the US that way as well.
There are, honestly, quite practical reasons to stay true to one's own principles. Basically, that's the course you've set yourself, and thus it becomes the standard you're judged by.
-- Acyl