"Unconstitutional" has become a lazy way to dress up a claim that something is bad. I'm not saying that what's going on with surveillance in the U.S. is a good thing, but you're not helping your cause here.
(For that matter, there's nothing about a "right to overthrow [a] corrupt government" in the Constitution either. nullsocket may be thinking of the Declaration of Independence, and its basis in the social contract theory of Locke's Second Treatise on Government.)
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
King George did have redcoats going around searching homes, opening mail, etc. in "problem" areas. He did run a police state. It is very likely the Framers wrote the Constitution with that in mind.
And seeing how off shoring has gone in general and the state/direction of the economy (and the us economy in particular), it's only a matter of time before the tax payers start demanding/bringing those "jobs" back home ;)
[0] http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/Backchannels/2...
The revolutionaries that founded the US didn't care that they would be breaking laws. That's kind of the point.
Eventually they had to shift their goal to outright independence to achieve those ends, but even that shift was accompanied by a detailed list of grievances (known as the Declaration of Independence) illustrating why exactly they felt they had to take that step.
Of course, those who actually bother to read that Declaration will note that it emphasizes that even moderate problems with the government should be accepted as a matter of course.
Their problem was not government, or laws, or anything like that. Obviously so, since otherwise they wouldn't have formed a government with laws after the Treaty of Paris, and then scrapped that government a few years later because it sucked so bad that it needed replaced with an even stronger government that the U.S. still operates under today.
Rather, their problem was the lack of the British Crown's desire (in their view) to uphold Britain's own laws and charters as applied to the colonies.
Unless you fancy a theocracy.