WASHINGTON, D.C.–Big Brother, who had been planning to rifle through our diaries under the guise of protecting us from the unwanted advances of teenage boys and terrorists, finally received a mild spanking and frowns from Mom and Dad. On Thursday, the U.S. Senate voted to limit part of the Total Information Awareness Program that would allow the government to read all Internet email and search through all commercial databases of health, financial, and travel companies in the name of the “war” on terrorism.
According to Senator Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, who proposed the restrictions as part of an amendment to a spending bill, several Republicans saw the Pentagon’s insidious plan as “about the most far-reaching government surveillance proposal we have ever heard about.” Unfortunately, the restrictions left a few loopholes through which the Department of Defense will probably be able to smuggle enough White Out to cover most of the 4th Amendment–not that anyone reads the Constitution anymore.
But hey, maybe we’ll all grow up to be big and strong some day, and Big Brother won’t seem so big after all.