Why do western democratic governments punish their populations for what criminals do?  This &quot;crackdown&quot; makes free speech into a privilege, something to be withheld by The Authorities as the consequences of bad actions. Since there are very, very few terrorists, The Authorities are punishing the masses for the actions of a very few.<p>I don&#x27;t think this will end well. The price of liberty is a lot smaller than the cost of oppression, as Mark Twain once said.