It's not about people's safety, it's about politicians' safety. See my comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45331829
Of course they don't need to spy on themselves. The goal is to stop targeted attacks against politicians and any attempts to overthrow the government. The government is uniquely unlikely to overthrow itself.
Empirically that’s absurd. The US is currently undergoing an internal struggle that’s exemplified by the agents of change being part of the government AND dangerously hostile to opposition.
the theater that is US Dem-Rep politics would never threaten its own existence regardless how much one side screams the other will be the end of democracy when the stage changes. Maybe bookmark this thread and come back next term when the next play hast started.
If you had said that 30 years ago I might have agreed with you. But I don't because in the last 30 years I've watched both parties drift farther right until one decided to team up with actual nationalists (project 2025, they wrote a book about it and several of the authors work for this administration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_2025 ) that intend to undermine the foundation of the government in order to enforce a white christian nationalist order.
I don't remember Democrats ever conducting a legal (fake elector scheme) or extralegal attempt (insurrection) to overthrow an election. I don't remember any leader ever saying the kinds of hateful things Trump does. Even Reagan and Bush 1 who peddled the whole "welfare queen" bullshit. I don't remember any admin prior to this one that removed research and published number wholesale from government website.
This is not normal and hasn't been for some time. I don't have a comprehensive list right now of all the ways this is batshit crazy because keeping track would be a full time job.
But sure, let's bookmark this thread and come back to it.