Oh yes! And sport. I love that too.

For me, I think there are two primary features that I admire in older people, which also characterize the sort of life that I would like to have lived (by the time I'm 80). 

First of all, I admire people who make commitments carefully, and then keep them, and allow their lives from that point to be shaped by them. This is hard, because life's most serious commitments have a way of leading you in directions you don't expect (and sometimes don't like). It can be tough to stick to things without becoming either bitter or downtrodden (in a sour grapes-y kind of way). But those who manage it are always well worth knowing.

The second thing is that I admire people who cultivate a broad and deep appreciation of the good and the beautiful. There's a kind  of Aristotelian snobbery to that ambition, but so it goes; I think it's too late for me to be beautifully simple, so I'd best try to be genuinely knowledgeable and cultured. I particularly love nature, liturgy and the written word, but also music, art and food. And of course, the study of human nature.

At my age, planning a eulogy for myself represents a temptation to make a wish list of things I'd like to have accomplished by then. Which may just invite self-aggrandizement! But I sometimes think about a related question: what sort of elderly person would you (eventually) like to be?

I think about this because, while we're supposed to flatter older people by talking up their wisdom and experience, my observations suggest that elderly people can be just as foolish, myopic or selfish as younger people. The difference is that their character reflects their (more extensive) experiences, and their understanding of what those experiences mean. This makes them *candidates* for wisdom in a way that younger people generally aren't, but people don't always draw the right lessons from their life's successes and failures. And older people have lost the flexibility and adaptability that younger people have, so there's a sense in which their failings are less redeemable at that point.

So, for younger people it may be instructive to consider: what older people do you know whose life/character you find admirable? How might you become that sort of person? 

Kohana, I think people feel, reasonably in my view, that justice can't be done by a camera. Especially one that only sees the plate, not even the driver.

Wow, I really hate this idea. Talk about turning neighbors against one another! It might be a close call if people were turning others in only out of civic duty, but accepting money to report your fellow citizens (even though it isn't your job)? No, that's just shameless.

I'm cool with stealing secrets from the Chinese military.

On the other hand, it's completely legal to run some Google searches to make sure your new employees aren't conservatives....

Yes, but on the other hand, overregulation also leads to less consumer choice and less innovation. So, there's that.

Apparently Father's Day is the #1 steak-eating day in the US, but I don't know about ribs.

I didn't really think Brooks' piece was about the NSA one way or the other. It certainly didn't exonerate them. The point was that, whether or not the organization behaved improperly otherwise, we should certainly be concerned to have people like Snowden staffing it. This seems to me like a very real concern, and I think Brooks articulates some of the reasons rather well.

I find they peel great if I dump them straight into ice water after boiling. Regardless of age.

Leslie, when you complain about Brooks' presumption that "everyone shares the same idea of how a society functions well," what exactly do you mean? Are you just saying that Brooks is overconfident in his assertions and insufficiently attentive to the merits of opposing views? Or is it wrong even to have views about how a society functions well? I mean, all Aristotelians (and I hate even to classify Brooks in that category, because he's always seemed like kind of an "Arisotle lite" guy, but in a broad-brush way it seems applicable here) think that there are sorts of societies that facilitate human thriving, and others that don't, and that particular sorts of political structures will help us to develop thriving societies. Surely it's not offensive to go that far? So, could you articulate where Brooks goes wrong?

It seems to me that Brooks' primary complaint isn't that Snowden wanted to embarrass "Big Brother" so much as that he didn't care who else in his life he hurt in the process. And the bottom line would be that, even if you agree (and Brooks never denies it) that our present institutions are ugly and corrupt in many ways, you're never going to build better ones out of people like Snowden. Thus, we should not admire or lionize him, even if we agree that his specific concerns are legitimate.

But if what Denise says is true, Brooks is critiquing progressivism above all. Because he's arguing that large public institutions can't fill that gap. Not only can they not do everything that local institutions/communities/families do, federal institutions can't even function effectively without the local institutions, communities and families, because those are the source from which capable institution-builders come.

I might add here that I've found it a little disturbing how quickly conservatives look at scandals and jump to the conclusion that government is evil. Don't misunderstand me; I do recognize that bigger government tends to foster corruption more than small, and that large, invasive governments can do more damage when they are corrupt.

Still and all, we need to be more careful about drawing distinctions, because we often make it sound as though the corruption of public institutions is just another example of government doing what government does. I do not accept that conclusion. Yes, government always has some tendency towards corruption, just as humans always have some tendency towards sin, but that doesn't mean that corrupt activities should just be labeled as "par for the course". We deserve better, and should demand it. Public institutions are not always and necessarily corrupt. Or, maybe more realistically: they could be a lot better. But they could also get a lot worse. Let's push for better.

Hmm. Well, I'm with Joseph Eager. I think this critique misfires. The thing is, Brooks isn't arguing that government institutions need to be "strong" in the sense of having lots of invasive powers, nor is he suggesting that institutions take priority over communities, either in order of causality or in importance. What he's saying is that Snowden is a hypocrite on a deep level. He wants to justify his activities by claiming that he's keeping the NSA honest, but no institution can be honest when it's staffed by people like Snowden, who lack the basic sensibilities that are needed for any cooperative enterprise.

Do we need *any* government institutions? And do we want the ones there are to be capable and honest? If you can answer yes to those two questions, it seems to me you can get on board with Brooks' critique. If I had to summarize it in a line, it seem to me that Brooks is saying: "Institutions can't replace communities, because strong communities produce the sorts of people who can build institutions effectively."