MURDER THE MESSENGER

No, not Tony. This is a real sentiment, being expressed by the loudest self-proclaimed patriots in America.

All because reporters insist on doing their jobs.

On Monday, ABC reported:

A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources.

"It's time for you to get some new cell phones, quick," the source told us in an in-person conversation.

An alert reader pointed us to ABC's blog, The Blotter, where a discussion about the story is underway.

There are many scary people in this world. A sampling of the comments:

I am a journalism graduate, UNC-Chapel Hill. I am also a veteran. I hope they catch every government leaker of classified secret information and put them in prison for life. And any reporter publishing known classified secret information should be shot. It is called treason, not first amendment rights.
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I am tired of thae (sic) news media leaking secret information in order to hurt PREDIDENT BUSH. I would prosucute the news media leakers for treason like LINCOLN did. We are at WAR with a enemy who whants to take over the world by force or kill all of us.
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Personally, as I don't call anyone associated with Al Qaeda, I don't CARE if the Government tracks me, listens to me or records me. Only the guilty should be nervous. Is ABC and the NYT Guilty of aiding terroism or are they/you simply guilty of undermingin (sic) our security by letting the terrorists know what we are trying to do to stop them? In either case, you should be ashamed.

If the U.S. government is spying on its citizens, the terrorists have won. President Bush said so in September 2001, remember? He told us why the terrorists had attacked the U.S.:

They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other ...

Freedom and fear are at war. The advance of human freedom -- the great achievement of our time, and the great hope of every time -- now depends on us. Our nation -- this generation -- will lift a dark threat of violence from our people and our future. We will rally the world to this cause by our efforts, by our courage. We will not tire, we will not falter, and we will not fail.

But surely we have failed. There is fear and loss of freedoms, and the dark threat seems to come not only from our enemies, but also from our government.

One paragraph from Bush's 2001 speech now evokes a double meaning. He was speaking of al Qaeda then, but now the mirror has turned:

By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions -- by abandoning every value except the will to power -- they follow in the path of fascism, and Nazism, and totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way, to where it ends: in history's unmarked grave of discarded lies.

We the people deserve no less.