| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"" |
| Date: |
08 Oct 2004 10:59:34 PM |
| Object: |
Losing Liberty |
http://www.detnews.com/2003/specialreport/0306/24/a10-201072.htm
Tuesday, June 24, 2003
Losing Liberty: Privacy
Patriot Act Amounts to War on Privacy
Congress should assess impact of original anti-terrorism act before
expanding powers with Patriot II
By The Detroit News
The USA Patriot Act has become an all-season license for the federal
government to fish for information on law-abiding citizens in the name
of national security.
The measure, which was rushed through Congress after Sept. 11, 2001,
greatly expands the power of law enforcement to spy on the everyday
activities of Americans. Among the concerns is that it:
* Loosens the rules to plant devices that track computer
correspondence and telephone calls.
* Opens the way for U.S. citizens to have their homes searched and
communications monitored without probable cause.
* Allows searches of property without telling the owner right away --
giving them no chance to challenge the intrusion.
Those and other problems pointed out by legal experts and civil
libertarians haven't deterred law enforcement agencies, which are
asking for even greater powers in a proposal dubbed Son of Patriot, or
Patriot II.
The original Patriot law clearly crosses the line that bars
unreasonable government scrutiny of individuals who have neither
broken the law nor are suspected of breaking it.
Worse, information about an ordinary crime uncovered in a terrorist
investigation employing the extraordinary powers of the Patriot Act --
powers intended for national security purposes -- can be used by local
prosecutors.
The Patriot Act, for example, has been used to prosecute a variety of
nonterrorism cases, including drug violations, credit card fraud and a
lawyer who defrauded his clients.
But more insidiously, the act transforms the Justice Department's
mission from prosecution to pre-emption. The preventative measures are
intrusive and treat all citizens as suspects.
Attorney General John Ashcroft explains the the shift in the
government's approach this way:
"The Department of Justice has undergone a significant evolution, from
the idea that we somehow existed so that we could prosecute crimes
that had been committed -- and in that sense, we waited until a crime
was committed and then sought to prosecute -- to finding a way to
prevent a crime from being committed."
Preventing crime is a desireable goal, of course. But not by
pre-emptively trampling the privacy rights of all Americans to catch a
few wrongdoers.
Under the Patriot Act, there is less of a protective wall between a
powerful government and a law-abiding citizen. And if the Founding
Fathers agreed on anything, it was that such a wall should be built
high and carefully maintained.
In its favor, the Patriot Act restrains agents from investigating U.S.
citizens "solely upon the basis of activities protected by the First
Amendment." But the unspoken and unwritten flip side of the language
is downright chilling: The government can base an investigation
"partly" on someone exercising their First Amendment rights.
That means someone who expresses a passionate objection to, say, the
way the war on terrorism is being conducted might open the door for
investigators to delve deeply into his private life.
The conflict between privacy and security stems from the nature of
terrorism. Today, the concern is a repeat of terrorist violence within
the U.S. borders. Prior to Sept. 11, the battle to maintain national
security was generally considered an external fight -- the threat was
based overseas, and combatting it did not often involve the rights of
American citizens or other constitutional issues.
Now it does.
After the Patriot Act passed, the Justice Department sought
coordination between intelligence agents and domestic law enforcement
agencies. Together, the two form a more powerful response to
terrorism. But they also pose a more powerful threat to privacy. For
example, in chasing down information under loose national security
rules, the government can look at an American's financial, phone and
travel records even if that person is under no suspicion of
wrongdoing.
So under the guise of a terrorist probe, a tax scofflaw can find
himself in court.
The two Patriot Acts invest too much power in the executive branch of
government and minimize the role of the judiciary. For example, the
government can peek into telephone and computer traffic by, in effect,
certifying to itself that the information would likely be relevant to
an ongoing criminal investigation. If such a determination is made,
the agents can short-circuit judicial scrutiny. Judicial oversight is
weakened partly because investigators argue that speed and stealth are
at a premium in terrorism investigations.
The original Patriot Act passed in a relative flash, zipping through
Congress in six weeks as the World Trade Center smoldered and as the
country was in both mourning and shock. Emotions were raw.
But now there's time for reflection on what the measures mean to the
privacy rights of Americans.
Congress should stop being a bystander and resist the effort to extend
the Patriot Act provisions. It should also consider repealing some of
the more onerous measures that invade privacy.
The impact the terrorism war has had on basic privacy rights has not
been fully calculated. Such an assessment is essential before giving
government agencies even more power to delve into the secret places of
its citizens' lives.
The two Patriots
* USA Patriot Act, passed Oct. 26, 2001, 45 days after 9-11. It made
domestic police surveillance easier and allowed closer coordination
between the CIA and FBI and local police.
* Patriot II draft proposals for more government powers leaked out
this year from the Justice Department, which says the ideas are not
being formally proposed.
* Critics say that, taken together, both Patriots erode the
traditional bar against unreasonable search and seizure.
--
Contempt of Congress meter reading-offscale.
Vote for Bush. Why vote for the lesser of two evils?
No matter the candidates the superstition industry wins.
'Jesus' is a sock-puppet Christians utilize to add 'authority' to
whatever action they intend on taking. -Stoney
.
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