EXHIBITIONISTS WANTED

WATCH WHAT YOU DO, WATCH WHAT YOU SAY
Bush Administration Would Again Be Voyuer on Your Habits
Whether you like the porn of politics or elect to watch wicked wantons, the Bush Administration wants to know your preferences on the Internet and has appealed a judge's ruling so it can  see what you see.

AP May 27, 2005: The legal filing with the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in New York comes amid a debate in Congress over renewal of the Patriot Act and whether to expand the FBI's  power to seek records without the approval of a judge or grand jury.

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero of New York last year blocked the government from conducting secret searches of communications records, saying the law that authorized them wrongly barred legal challenges and imposed a gag order on affected businesses.

The government wants to know what you do in secret, in the privacy of your own home.  However, it does not want you to know what it is doing to find out what you are doing.  That information must remain SECRET.

The bone of contention that the government would prefer buried out of sight is the National Security Letter, a document to be presented to a judge to allow access to your private affairs.

AP:The ruling came in a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union and an Internet access firm that received a national security letter from the FBI demanding records. The identity of the firm remains secret.

The government was authorized to pursue communications records as part of a 1986 law. Its powers were enhanced by the Patriot Act in 2001.

The administration said the judge's ruling was off the mark because the company did mount a legal challenge to the demand for records. "Yet in this very case, the recipient of the NSL did precisely what the NSLs supposedly prevent recipients from doing," the filing said.

The law's ban on disclosing that such a letter has been received also is appropriate because of legitimate security concerns, the government said.

So what is a National Security Letter?

The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security offers the following definition:
National Security Letter (NSL) – an administrative subpoena that can be used only ininternational counterterrorism or foreign counterintelligence investigations. An
administrative subpoena allows the FBI to request documents or testimony without priorapproval from a grand jury, court, or other judicial entity. NSLs cannot be used in criminal investigations unrelated to international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities.
source

The first security concern of our government should be that we are free to exercise out liberty. The most disquieting aspect of the government's argument is that everything needs to be done as it deems appropriate and what it deems appropriate must be done in secret.  History is replete with abuse done in secret.  True safe guards for liberty have no need for secrecy of the sort the government wants.

ACLU MAY 26, 2005:

The "national security letter" provision of the Patriot Act goes too far in letting the government secretly gather confidential records and gagging those ordered to turn them over, the American Civil Liberties Union said in testimony before a key panel of lawmakers Thursday.

"This provision lets the government force businesses to turn over confidential records in ‘national security investigations,’ even if the investigation isn’t linked to criminal activity," said Gregory T. Nojeim, Acting Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office, who appeared before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security. "Those served with these secret order are gagged from telling anyone about it. Lawmakers need to make sure these letters aren’t used to gather information about lawful political or religious activities that are protected under the Constitution."

--snip--

The Justice Department and the administration have argued that this national security letter power was on the books long before the Patriot Act. But that’s not the whole truth, the ACLU noted. While the statute struck down was enacted in 1986, the Patriot Act dramatically expanded it.

The original statute allowed the FBI to issue national security letters only where it had reason to believe that the subject of the letter was a "foreign agent," like a spy or a terrorist. Section 505 of the Patriot Act removes the individualized suspicion requirement and authorizes the FBI to use national security letters to obtain information about anyone at all if the FBI says the records are relevant to an intelligence investigation.

A key failing of the government's argument is that everyone be open to indiscriminate investigation.  The government's own methods of inquiry, however, cannot be open to any inquiry.  Watch what we say, not what we do.

SOME HELFPUL PATRIOT ACT LINKS:
 

THE PATRIOT ACT: THE CURRENT LAW

SUNSET PROVISIONS

OVERVIEW OF PATRIOT ACT ONE

OFFICE OF INSPECTOR GENERAL REPORT ON ABUSES

OVERVIEW OF PATRIOT ACT TWO

If This Concerns You, Contact  Members of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security:

Coble (R-North Carolina) 
Lungren (R-Wisconsin)
Green (R-California)
Feeney (R-Florida
Chabot (R-Ohio)
Keller (R-Florida)
Flake (R-Arizona)
Pence(R-Indiana)
Forbes(R-Virginia)
Gohmert(R-Texas)
Scott (D-Virginia)

Jackson Lee (D-Texas)
Waters (D-California)
Meehan (D-Massachussetts)
Delahunt (D-Massachussetts)
Weiner (D-NY)

Comments

[aithne]

I so want to believe this is not true...and yet I know better.

[jillian]

all this the government can learn about us, yet we can't know who Cheney met behind closed doors to shape our Energy Policy.

[The Alchemist]

So are you chaps still using the line 'land of the free' or or do you just hum when the song gets to that bit?

[beatsdplx]

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