Our Government is Spying On All of Us, At Will

Not many decades ago, the US was a bastion of individual freedoms. We were envied and admired around the world for government transparency, open courts and laws, ability to petition the government, individual freedoms and privacy, and freedom of the press. Our rights were protected and defended by the US government. Individuals had equal rights with the government's.

I am reading today multiple pieces of news that confirm that the US government does not care about our privacy at all. Government agencies tasked with 'our national security' absolutely hate the idea that we have private lives and thoughts.

During the past decade the tables have gradually turned and the government has gained the upper hand. They can snoop on our entire communication portfolio 'as they see fit' and without shame or any court/independent supervision. Our rights have been flushed down the toilet by well funded government agencies and very lenient 'secret'/closed courts. How can such government practices be constitutional? Soviet Union used to do exactly such things and we were criticizing them. As we can read now, we are doing the exact same things, only amplified by many thousands of times in terms of magnitude (scale) and intensity.

How can we go around the world and tell -say- China or Iran that they are not respecting their citizens' human rights when we are as guilty of even more egregious abuses? Have we lost our sense of free Americans and have become immune to government's actions and abuses? How can we accept sheepishly what the government is doing when they violate our basic constitutional rights at privacy?

In the name of defending us from evil doers our government has become pure and distilled evil.

Some people will say that if we save a single life by allowing the government to spy on us then this is perfectly legit and we should mind our own business. I beg to differ with this train of thought as -daily- we lose hundreds of lives to gun violence, car crashes, and tobacco use and the government has never spied on us because we drive a car. Or has it?