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The recent news that the National Security Agency tracks domestic phone calls as part of its terrorist surveillance program has revived the debate over whether such activities stretch or cross constitutional limits. Voices editor Ajay Singh asked people on campus what they think of such surveillance.

Richard Ribble, budget manager, Medical Center Financial Services

I have two opposing views. The first is, why should anyone care who tracks their phone calls if they have nothing to hide. The second is, I don’t like any government having that much information about me because I don’t trust them with the kind of power they have.

Karina Hernandez, second-year mechanical engineering student

I have two opposing views. The first is, why should anyone care who tracks their phone calls if they have nothing to hide. The second is, I don’t like any government having that much information about me because I don’t trust them with the kind of power they have.

Elizabeth Kopp, third-year international development studies student

It’s very wishy-washy. On the one hand, we’ve got this ideological war against terrorism. On the other, the state has breached the boundaries of what’s acceptable. It all seems too Big Brotherly. What are we in — 1984?

David Poepoe, library assistant, Young Research Library

There are precedents for the government’s monitoring of phone calls in times of war. This is just a continuation of those methods for protecting the citizenry, and the circumstances certainly justify it. In any case, they’re doing it to everybody — everyone’s under suspicion — so at least they’re being fair about that.

Andrew Sabl, associate professor of public policy

This doesn’t upset me all that much. Warrantless wiretaps, which let the NSA hear actual conversations, threaten privacy and liberty much more. So does our unreflective use of “terrorist surveillance program” — that’s the (Bush) administration’s propaganda label for what everyone called “warrantless wiretaps” when they were first exposed. We should all worry less about these matters than about this country’s widespread use of torture, for which no high officials have been held accountable. That phone records affect all of us, but torture only a few, renders our bias more understandable but no more admirable.