Recently a friend confided to me, "I can no longer check my air baggage at the curbside. I cannot use the automatic e-ticket machine. I have to stand in line to get my seat assignment. Apparently my name is now on some kind of security list. All they would tell me was, 'Because your birthday is July 4.' I do not feel that this is anymore my country, the one I grew up to love."

Neither he nor I have access to the mysteries of national security that would explain why a birthday can be a clue to the identity of a terrorist. But his new feeling about his country is duplicated in millions of others of us. Not long ago I was asked to write a foreword to a book by a German colleague who is very critical of the current foreign policies of the US government, including the role that religion seems to play in those policies. Over my lifetime I have written thousands of published pages. But in writing that short piece, for the first time I asked myself, "Will my stated agreement with most of this book bring me to the attention of government? Will the publication of this book endanger the tax exemptions of this Midwestern press?"

Pick up the phone these days, discover that the call is from Germany or South Africa, and the thought occurs, "Who is listening to this call, what NSA computer is programmed to pick up certain words in this international conversation?"

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