Do we have a moral or legal obligation to question or refuse illegal government activity?

Aeolus and I were discussing this over instant messaging, and we wanted to invite you all to join in.

We would like to discuss the more philosophical aspects of the Senate's decision to grant immunity to telecom companies that complied with NSA wiretapping requests (demands?).

Should the law allow people and corporations to perform illegal activities at the government's command? What are the moral implications of doing so? Further, if you are unsure of the legality of your actions, and fear that refusing the government's request would violate the law, does morality demand that you violate the law before violating the public interest?

In this particular case, is our verdict affected by the fact that the corporation possessed, at the time of the wiretapping, a legal and moral obligation to protect the privacy of its customers?

I will admit that I am still on the fence on this one, since it is obviously a tough call. From a legal perspective, I am hesitant to accept the telecoms' argument that they should be exempted from legal responsibility for their actions because those actions were ordered by a government agency. These companies have massive legal departments and plenty of ready cash to bring in outside consultants, in order to determine whether or not 1) the NSA's request was legal and 2) disobeying the request was legal. If their primary concern had been the protection of their customers, I think we would have seen a lot more resistance on their part, and this probably would have come to light sooner. As such, I am inclined to feel that they did not take their customers' rights very seriously, and thus were relatively happy to throw their duty of care under the bus when the going got tough. This hardly seems to satisfy their legal obligation to their customers.

This sort of situation is difficult to imagine on an individual level, but there are examples. As a CPA (soon to be, I hope), there are certain responsibilities that I have to my clients that are not easily discharged. If specific records regarding one of my clients are legally subpoenaed, I have no client-accountant privilege and must turn over the records. However, absent this sort of legal process, I am forbidden from revealing confidential information about any of my clients. If a NSA agent came up to me and requested to rifle through my computer, I feel that I would be legally (and morally) obligated to refuse access until I was satisfied that the request was a legal one. On the other hand, would I be conflicted on whether I wanted to risk prison for my clients? You bet.

My professional situation would also differ from being asked by a cop on the street to use a spare key to let them into a neighboring apartment. I may or may not know what my responsibilities and rights are, and thus may make the incorrect decision. In this case, I would hope that prosecutors and judges would take that uncertainty into account when choosing whether to press charges or pass sentence.

Ultimately, then, I feel that telecom immunity is the wrong decision from a legal standpoint. I would much prefer that the law stand as is, leaving these companies accountable. This would leave it to the prosecutors to decide not to press charges, or to the courts to acquit them. The legislature is the supreme authority in the land, and I do not feel it is appropriate for them to grant special immunity from prosecution to a group of individuals that are quite capable of defending themselves, while failing to clarify the legal situation for the rest of us. This will send a signal to corporations that they can expect safe haven if they follow government requests without question, while doing nothing to guide me when faced with a similar situation. That sounds like a double standard, a failure to govern, and a dangerous precedent about executive power all in the same breath.

From a moral perspective, well. If you know me, you know that I tend towards breaking the law in such situations, but I am interested to hear other arguments.

Why do we need to remember?

Please forgive me if you find this post to be self-serving, but I wanted to test an axiom of the public history field on a wider audience.

The phrases "Always Remember" and "Never Forget" complete with the obnoxious redundancy and annoying capital letters are ubiquitous in the public discourse around memorialization. Scholars use fancy terminology (like lieux de memoire) to express roughly the same desire on a "collective" level. Some credit the vocal presence of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum with the proliferation of this sentiment, but it's easy to find echoes stretching back to "Remember the Alamo" and beyond. This sentiment has fueled the urgency behind the creation of every war memorial in the United States, but particularly memorials to controversial conflicts, from the Civil War to Vietnam.

So I pose this question: why are we so afraid of forgetting significant events?

And as a corollary: Are we more afraid people in the future will remember them differently?

Are People Becoming Overspecialized?

When I was driving home from my father's house one day, I heard a commercial for a service in the local area (which includes the town where I grew up) called "Captain Laundry". The commercial started with a couple devolving rather rapidly into a screaming match over who would do the laundry, because neither of them had any time to do it. "Captain Laundry" kindly makes itself available to come to your house and do your laundry and dry-cleaning for you, so you don't have to worry about it.

This rather irritating commercial got me thinking about the concept of comparative advantage: in economic theory, nations will supposedly specialize in those areas where they can produce more value than other nations. I wonder if this idea has started to permeate individual lives, as well.

There seems to be an increasing tendency to think that all of our actions have opportunity costs that are measured in real income. If you are better at one thing than at all other things, you should devote almost all of your time to doing that thing, because you will be able to make more money doing that. Since you command a premium in that one activity, you can then afford to pay someone else to do all the stuff you are slightly less good at, but in which they excel. Economically, everyone wins, because they get to demand the highest price for their time.

Does anyone else see this as being increasingly true? If so, do you think it is healthy for the human mind to be transformed into a one-dimensional task handler? Do we lose something of ourselves by devoting what is fundamentally a generalist intelligence and skill set to an increasingly limited scope of activities?

Inaugural Post

I don't even blog enough to my own blog, but I figured I might be more likely to if we had an actual discussion forum. Acting like a French salon member of the poofy-hair era is encouraged, but not required.

In keeping with a salon, I would like all posts to contain something of substance, the purpose of which is to provoke discussion. There is obviously nothing wrong with levity or snark (both are expected), but we can keep one-off links and random crazy to e-mail.

Also in keeping with a salon, all members should be prepared to read the occasional stemwinder. Depth as well as breadth are welcome here, although obviously you do not have to address every point of previous posters to contribute to a discussion. You may also expect some rather archaic subject matter, depending on the whims of the group.

I would like the group of authors to be relatively small. I have invited this particular group because each of us have a unique perspective on life and on potential discussion topics, and we are all intellectually inclined and earnest in our convictions.