I've been floating the idea on the prospective Presidential candidates' Facebook pages of enacting a comprehensive defense of personal privacy in the electronic age, if necessary via Constitutional Amendment.

Let none of us forget that in addition to such things as the antics of the voyeurs at the NSA, the FCC enacted the Government Takeover version of Net Neutrality, Title II, nine months ago - which means we must insist that Net Neutrality Title II be abolished in favor of Title I as soon as the adults regain control of the Executive branch, Title I being the non-Orwell version. ['Net entrepreneur Michael Glenn gave an excellent discussion of the distinction, in a presentation to the LA/Santa Monica Tea Party in January 2015, viewable here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIbBg... ]

The examples are endless: In the aftermath of the George Zimmerman fiasco, where "Spike" Lee publicized the street address of the Zimmerman family and - D'OH! - it was a different George Zimmermann (not that such a thing could ever be ethical in any case); with reports of union thugs doing the same thing with the addresses of basically anybody who opposes them; with the epidemic of "Identity Theft" and the avalanche of "data breaches," there should be a new, codified deterrent against the use of electronic means to attack others.

To date, what we've seen is the legal equivalent of "Can't we all just be nice to one another?" That just does not cut it, and needs significant strengthening. The specifics will need to be hashed out, certainly, but at the very least any publication of any citizen's home address without their prior consent should be a major criminal offense; if such action results in injury, mandatory prison time; conviction of identity theft should carry a massive prison sentence, etc.

The electronic revolution, like the industrial revolution, has been a vast benefit to humanity. and promises similarly-vast advances in the future. But like every technology, it can be used for as great an evil as it can for good - and in a civilization that's embraced the same kind of non-absolutism and moral greyness that plagued late Weimar Germany, the power conferred via electronic means has become a profoundly destructive thing - a fact largely unaddressed, to date. This must change, dramatically.
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Do you mind explaining your last sentence a little more?

I don't believe it needs to be listed in the Constitution but IMHO it is covered by the 4th Amendment. A private conversation is the property of the parties involved. It makes no difference if it is in person, on paper or over a wire. Until it is published publicly it is private property.

That's what I thought. They are good for a couple more years, then repeat.

EU bailed it out at last minute

Switch to supernatural Lovecraft. If nothing else, you'll always get dreary atmosphere. .

You should know me better than that by now.

Ever since communications have been available to anyone able to see them, privacy has been a farce. One defense was to send messages in code. Now, we have computers that can crack most of them in no time. Privacy is a convenient fiction, and nothing more.

I thought Greece was still in trouble.

worked in greece tho. changed the government. I suspect its going to work in venezuela too

That's what I expected but nothing to confirm. Thanks for the insight.

I get that. Pipe dream.

Privacy?
If they want to spy on me, I hope they get a load of my 81 year old gravity distorted, unmuscular, wrinkled body. They'll never get that image out of their minds. I know I can't.
But if I have to sacrifice my privacy for security, F...it! I don't need security that badly. I don't need ANYTHING that badly. However, I don't think a single candidate gets it or would agree with me.

From my crypt of hidden files: in the 1970s, most long distance telephone traffic traveled at least part of the way by microwave transmission. It was common practice to intercept those transmissions and select the ones of interest. Voice recognition was in the earliest stages then, but fairly reliable. The NSA attitude then was "Warrants? We don't need no stinkin' warrants!"

With the arrival of the internet, and cell phones, the opportunity for intercept became seductively irresistible for government agencies. Invasion of what we think of as our privacy was well underway long before the Patriot Act.