Nothing in his editorial comes as a surprise. David Brooks remains the same neoconservative apologist that he was in the spring of 2003, when he was beating the war drums for President Bush. Show me a David Brooks editorial and I'll show you a point in an unbroken ideological party line that goes back for more than a decade. He even got a guest appearance in David Brooks' new book "So Wrong for So Long", highlighting his role in propagandizing the Iraq war. All that said, his argument is lacking an important detail as well--the recognition of culture and society on the Internet. We're not all solitary loners, naked against the machine of the state. We're a global culture that is based on free exchange of information, as well as open, informed, and vigorous debate, and a fluid voluntary participation in social groups and organizations that is nothing like the clubs or companies of yesteryear. Our culture is strong enough to be building toward an immense demographic shift in U.S. politics. Tomorrow's senators and congressmen are today's high schoolers and college kids. We aren't likely going to allow a system of lifelong surveillance to jeopardize the future integrity of our social structures either. On the whole, I'm not too swayed by Mr. Brooks' arguments.