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Before Barack Obama became president, he reveled in the irresponsibility of his powerlessness. He could denounce Bush administration counterterrorism initiatives from a glorious position of civil-libertarian purity and posit the need to strike a perfect balance “between privacy and security.”

Then he got elected president, and the mere posturing had to end. He had to grow up. Invested with responsibility for keeping the country safe and, no doubt, informed of potential threats in hair-raising terms on a daily basis, he jettisoned his innocent civil-libertarianism. In light of what were dire and real threats to our security, he had no choice but to use the surveillance powers of the government to foil them.

Now, President Obama thinks the Goldilocks balance he has always spoken of is struck by a vast National Security Agency monitoring program that vacuums up the phone records of all Americans. There is poetic justice in hearing the president excoriated in exactly the same terms as President George W. Bush by the very same people who worked to get him elected to end the terrible abuses of the Bush-Cheney regime. But the fact is that — in least this respect — Obama grew up and they didn’t.

As president, he didn’t have the luxury of turning his back on Bush policies merely because they were Bush policies. In his press conference, he said of the NSA program that upon taking office, he concluded “on net, it was worth us doing.” Whereas his allies can either pretend that the terror threat doesn’t exist or that there are easy and simple ways of combatting it, he has to deal with it in the real world. As he said of the programs, “My assessment and my team’s assessment was that they help us prevent terrorist attacks.”

There seems little question that the NSA programs are constitutional and legal. The Internet element is directed at foreigners overseas to whom our Fourth Amendment doesn’t apply.

As for the phone program, it involves metadata — i.e., phone numbers dialed, and for what duration, and from where — that courts have held aren’t protected by the Fourth Amendment the same way that the actual content of conversations are. Congress authorized the program, albeit somewhat vaguely, in Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act. The question here isn’t if Obama is lawless or shredding the Constitution. It is whether the program is proportionate and wise.

The metadata are fed into the maw of government algorithms. It is only anomalies that, assuming a court warrant can be obtained, get more attention. But the government is nonetheless sweeping up the records of Americans who have done nothing to earn anyone’s suspicion. The information lands on the desktops of the likes of whistleblower Edward Snowden, who it turns out isn’t a very reliable custodian of sensitive data.

The Snowden leak was wrong, but at least it makes possible an open debate about the program that might lead to useful tightening and new controls. Years ago, Barack Obama’s contribution to that debate might have been as hyperbolic and irresponsible as that of his disappointed friends. Now, evidently, he knows better.

Rich Lowry is editor of the National Review.

(c) 2013 by King Features Synd., Inc.

DELBARTON — An ongoing feud that began well over a year ago between two Delbarton families escalated into physical violence last week that resulted in the arrests of two males and two females.

According to the criminal complaints filed by West Virginia State Police Senior Trooper J.K. Harris states that Chad Adkins, 32, and Andy Lee Hunt, 52, Crystal Nadine Fouch, 39, amd Wanda Ferrell, 35,who are next door neighbors, were taken into custody after the trooper was dispatched to the location on a report of a dispute/altercation.

Adkins allegedly threw a rock and struck Crystal Nadine Fouch in the forehead, causing a small abrasion and contusion. This crime supposedly happened after an unidentified white male climbed a ladder overlooking the 10 ft. privacy fence that surrounds the backyard of Chad and Carolyn Adkins and proceeded to throw a large piece of wood at Chad Adkins, which did make contact. Fouch is accused of slinging another piece of wood onto the Adkins’ property, which struck a juvenile female child in the head, causing injury. When questioned by the state trooper, Fouch, Hunt, and Ferrell refused to provide the name of the male who had fled the scene.

Adkins was arrested and charged with one count of battery. Hunt was arrested on 2 counts of obstruction that stemmed from him yelling at the officer about the direction in which the investigation was going and is said to have approached the trooper in a threatening manner. The defendant then turned and stated he was going back inside his home and was ordered to stop by the officer, which he refused to do. Trooper Harris then took control of Hunt by grasping his wrist in order to prevent him from going inside the residence and Hunt responded by verbally and physically resisting. The defendant was then physically restrained and was placed in the police cruiser to be transported to the Southwestern Regional Jail along with Fouch, who was charged with one count each of battery and obstruction and Ferrell, who faces charges of a single count of obstruction.

Child Protective Services were also called to the scene to investigate the hostile environment created by the conflict between the families that was said to be an unfit condition for the minor children of both the Hunt and Adkins families to be exposed to, since it creates a potential safety risk.

The four defendants were arraigned before Mingo County Magistrate Pam Newsome. Hunt and Fouch were released from custody after posting a $2,000 bond and Ferrell on a $1,000 bond. Hunt remains incarcerated at this time on a $1,000 bond due to a previous criminal charge.