Germany Is Outraged Over US Spying

Germany has suffered through two periods in which governments have adopted spying as a method of political control.  It happened under Hitler, and it was used by the secret police in East Germany. Consequently, has done more to protect the privacy of its citizens from the potential misuse of data collected by Google and Facebook.  Angela Merkel has put this on her agenda for her coming meeting with President Obama.  The president is not under pressure from citizens in the US on this issue.  The majority of Americans appear to be more concerned about national security than they are about the potential harm that might come from government data mining practices.  In particular, Tea Party members, who call themselves libertarians, place a higher value on national security than they do on the protection of privacy.