THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

And that has been a fairly constant result in various polls taken on the subject of NSA domestic spying and other government intrusions.

Americans are fed up with the federal government collecting information on their phone calls, emails and Internet use, and they want curbs on what can be monitored, majorities say in a new McClatchy-Marist poll.

The July 15-18 survey also found widespread opposition to the Insider Threat Program revealed in a recent McClatchy story, a sweeping, unprecedented Obama administration initiative that has federal employees and contractors watching for “high-risk persons or behaviors” among co-workers.

“Privacy still counts, and federal employees snooping on each other, that’s out of bounds,” said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion at Marist College in New York, which conducted the poll.

The poll’s findings come as the House of Representatives considers defunding National Security Agency programs that collect telephone and other data. An unusual coalition of liberals and conservatives, concerned about the reach of an ever-intrusive government, is behind the effort.

Naturally this means that when Congress got a chance to do something about it, their answer was NO.

The House of Representatives on Wednesday tried mightily but fell short in its bid to send a tough, pointed message to the Obama administration: Put limits on the National Security Agency’s ability to collect personal data.

The 217-205 vote rejected an effort to require the government to only gather material on people under investigation. Wednesday’s action marked the first time Congress has extensively debated and voted on the programs since they were publicly revealed last month.

The effort drew an unusual coalition of liberals and conservatives concerned about privacy. But it couldn’t overcome fierce opposition led by the White House and congressional leaders.

“Passing this amendment takes us back to Sept. 10,” warned House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich.

The House did approve, by a vote of 409-12, a provision that did little more than reinforce current restrictions on data gathering. Critics of the spying programs agreed with Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., who dismissed it as a “fig leaf.”

Hey! At least we got a fig leaf out of it.