As legislators, you can understand that there's probably some confusion. I agree with you that there's a difference between consent in terms of...and I think a larger question is what we do with big data writ large. I certainly wouldn't want my debit card activities or my Google search results to be informative. I think even companies using that is an interesting policy discussion.
However, to me, putting something on a Facebook post with public settings is akin to pasting something on a telephone pole. At what point, as legislators, do we have to remove the nature of consent in terms of putting information into the public domain from privacy concerns? By putting information out in the public domain, isn't there an acknowledgement that you're consenting to do that? As such, the information would be considered public.
If I put a big statement about my weekend activities out in a paper format and posted it outside here, I would assume somebody would use that. I'm not sure how an electronic format changes that.