What makes you think those words weren't carefully chosen?

The words you chose were "ignorance" and "trolling". This was name calling and an ad hominem attack, not a mutually respectful discussion. Moreover, it is apparent to me that you were trying to argue with me without a clear understanding of my position.

I am sure there is more to Obama than just incompetence, and it has been painful to me to watch Americans fall for him so thoroughly in the recent years. But when you use the word "evil", you are in danger of losing the sight of the political landscape in the country. And, at the same time, losing the perspective on what the true evil is.

Example from my personal biography. I now live in the United States, came here 20 years ago from Russia, so before then I lived in the Soviet Union. USSR during the time of Brezhnev (which is the USSR I remember) was certainly worse in the aspects that were mentioned (liberties, personal rights, and so on; plus a totalitarian ideology, which is non-existent in the US). Even so, it was not an embodiment of evil. Before that, Stalin's times were much worse, and certainly closer to the absolute evil, but even that pales in comparison to Nazi Germany. Which, luckily, was destroyed well before I was born, so no personal memories. Was it evil? Perhaps, but it's a long way from Brezhnev's USSR which is a long way from the modern USA.

You, if you are a native born American, could go back to your (or your parents') history, comparing the USA of 2011 with the USA of 1960s, 1950s, WWII, and so on. Those were not evil times, and still the situation has noticeably improved since then.

I am not saying we should not be vigilant. I am saying we should not make every political disagreement into a battle field. People with whom we disagree are not necessarily monsters, maybe they simply have a different opinion or calculate odds differently. There is often, more often than not, room for compromises. They are people too.

Edit: I apologize for verbosity. Just thought you deserved an honest explanation.

You're right about Germany and Russia of the 1940's being different from the USA of today. And we'd like to keep it that way. Ergo, the very low tolerance for the kind of constitutional disregard that's going on.

Something else to keep in mind; unlike nearly every other country in the world, the US does not have a single, coherent, cultural, ethnic, or religious identity. There are dominant groups, to be sure, but none entirely so. This is a pluralistic country. There's an inherent fragility to that which demands increased respect for the law, given the absence of deep unifying tradition.

And when it comes to cancer, a tumor is deadly from the moment it appears. The sooner it's removed the better, otherwise it really will get out of hand. By American standards, what's happening is bad. Those standards may be tighter than standards elsewhere, but relative to the country it's a real shock. Plenty of intelligent people are really taken aback by the response to 9/11, which, in retrospect, has been vastly more damaging to the country than anything Bin Laden did directly.

Unlike Bin Laden, the people who are pushing for a total surveillance state are not dead. Nor are they retreating. And yes, what they are building is evil. Not because of anything that it's being used for presently, but for what it represents, in that it marks a shift from a government that is bound by the law to one that isn't, and simply asks that you trust it not to abuse its now-unchecked liberty. That is the precise opposite of what our Framers intended. To date, respect for that principle has spared us from a great deal of misery.

On this, we may disagree. But I appreciate your thoughtful reply. And I apologize for my personal remarks.