My point is anything beyond the OS is user choice. Nothing in the OS (that includes the default browser) should have spyware. I also feel alternate browsers should be included. If the user wants to install spyware that is their choice to make. Having Windows for an operating system is not exactly a choice for most, because they don't have a comparable substitute. But since we have a government that wants to make use of this embedded spyware, the inclusion will always be condoned. And it is a breach of our civil rights here in the US.
As long as spyware is condoned at a OS level, it will always be condoned in applications. We no longer have rights that our forefathers fought so hard to establish. There is a reason those rights were established and we have just about pissed them all away.