One should be weary of drawing too many inferences from a single poll. You can find wildly disparate results with two different polls. There is no question that American Muslims remain one of the most marginalized and demonized groups in United States. There has been a sustained propaganda campaign against Muslims for over a decade and it doesn't disappear over night. Those attitudes are hardened. But one of the things that polling often doesn't measure is the intensity of opinions.

Why is one view permissible and the other criminally barred - other than because the force of law is being used to control political discourse and one form of terrorism (violence in the Muslim world) is done by, rather than to, the west?

It is always unconscionable for the government to punish people for expressing an idea merely because government officials - or the majority of citizens - decide that those ideas are 'dangerous' or 'wrong.' That is a power nobody ought to possess.

What state surveillance actually is is best understood by the NSA's own documents and own words, which I think as you know I happen to have a lot of.

Nobody has the right to shield any idea as so sacred it can’t be challenged. ... Almost all human progress is driven by people who stood up and said ‘I disagree’ with this idea that society at the time considered to be the most precious.’

As a journalist, I think the only question that you ask yourself - once you've determined that the material is authentic - is what is in the public interest to know. And then you go about and report it.

The single most remarkable (and revealing) fact of the Obama presidency may very well be the lack of a single prosecution of Wall Street executives for the massive fraud that precipitated the 2008 financial crisis.