With the recent and accelerating leakage of the convoluted plethora of national security  intelligence programs afoot in the land, maybe it’s finally time for Big Brother to come out of the closet and tell the American people how and why we are giving up so many of our rights to privacy. I’m tired of hearing from retired Admirals and former security people and frustrated hackers about all this. Let’s hear it directly and from the top. Is our government so afraid that the American people can’t handle the truth? If they are, they should either bite the bullet and find a way to tell it, or step down in favor of those willing to trust the electorate. If we can’t trust our leaders then they can’t trust us, and they won’t be our leaders for much longer. I’ve seen too much intelligence BS in my 70 years, from Vietnam forward, to believe that the rationale for our intelligence programs can’t stand the light of day. We don’t need to know all the details that would aid our opponents, but we do need to know the foundation of principles upon which our intelligence systems are based and regulated, and from whence the trustable oversight is coming.