It's no longer a surprise that the government is reading your emails. What you might not know is that it can readily read most of your email without a warrant.

This is so ridiculous.. and very very sad, considering it probably wouldn't occur to most people that the people who make the rules are, by definition, above the rules. If you're in a position to make a rule that everyone else has to follow, under threat of punishment, then you are a ruler.

Imagine a medieval King with today's technology. Would he need permission (from himself?) to read his subjects' e-mails? No. Would he want to read everyone's mails?

Of course he would, because that would cement his position as a ruler, because by monitoring everyone's comms, he can spot anyone being a threat to him (by speaking the truth) and proceed to make a gruesome example out of the pesky thought-criminal.

People think that a pack of wolves will somehow limit their own sheep-eating activities, by writing some rules on a piece of magic paper (that magically prevents them from eating sheep).