So, NSA does not need to collect and store everyone’s email to provide security insights. They told a Clinton “Truth” when they said they shut the program down for “operational and resource reasons” – they meant they found another way to do it.
As far as phone records, all the bulk data is still available from the phone companies – it just requires observance of the 4th Amendment.
When we are asked to trade fundamental civil rights for security by a government that could find no wrongdoing at the IRS, blamed a minor film maker for its own deadly security lapse at Benghazi, runs an airport security agency which misses 95% of weapons it’s tasked with finding, prevaricates about the data it gathers on its own citizens, ignores precise warnings about bomb plots (the Tsarnaevs), refuses to use the words “Radical Islam” even while terrorists shouting “Allahu Akbar!” murder scores – calling the terrorists a lesser threat than climate change – why should we trust their promises regarding our civil rights?
Why, in fact, should we trust such power even to men and women with a good track record? Men and women in government change, sooner or later you get ones like we have now. A “good track record” means preserving and protecting the Bill of Rights.