Choosing between Big Brother and the Bill of Rights. Where do you stand?

Around 1:30 a.m. Saturday, there was a seismic shift in the U.S. Congress. As the Senate deadlocked over what to do about several expiring provisions of the Patriot Act, it became clear that political momentum had moved away from surveillance and secrecy toward freedom and privacy.

In a rare and theatrical overnight session, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell tried and failed to reauthorize or even briefly extend the Patriot Act's surveillance powers before senators left Washington for their weeklong holiday break. At every turn, he was blocked by a bipartisan group of civil libertarians and surveillance skeptics led by presidential hopeful Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, and Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon. Their main target was Section 215, which the government argues allows the National Security Agency to collect, store and analyze Americans' phone records and other intimate information in bulk.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-0529-abdo-martin-nsa-20150529-story.html