How else would you distribute “oratory” in the days before the Compact Audio Cassette? Radio stations might be owned by political rivals. But most people owned, or had access to turntables. (And if they didn’t, they might not reject socialism out of hand.)
The great thing about running the Rio Grande through Big Bend was the experience of wilderness, the sense that you were waaaay out there, like “for a moment, Jim, but the moment is fading”, lithium-cracking-facility-where-no-man-has-gone-before out there. Unbelievably remote. And the put-in point was a place to walk across the river. It’ll be hard to get that same feeling when you know you’re under five kinds of observation. Surveillance is forcing me, and presumably others (Peter Watts) to live in a continuous state of denial that we’re under observation, or to live with the knowledge that we’re being watched without being able to watch back. I don’t believe that’s a healthy choice either way.
(No, I’m not in favor of a border wall, virtual or actual, because I don’t believe there’s a problem large enough to justify the many costs.)