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Forty-five days after September 11th, the U.S. Congress passed the "Uniting and
Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools to Intercept and Obstruct
Terrorism Act" (or just the USA PATRIOT Act) with almost no debate.
The Patriot Act is supposed to help the United States
government catch terrorists. It act gives the FBI powers to obtain your medical, financial,
education and library records, and prevents hospitals, banks, schools and other
places from telling you that your records are being released. It gives the FBI
more powers of internet and phone surveillance, and even allows them to listen
in on conversations between lawyers and clients in federal custody! It lets the
Attorney General name groups as terrorist organizations, and allows intelligence
to be gathered at religious events. Also, it lets the FBI obtain a warrant and
search your house without informing you if the Attorney General has called it
an issue of national security.
Looking at this information, it would seem that
if you are not doing anything relating to terrorism, you are perfectly fine.
Wrong.
All the Attorney General has to do to put you under the
Patriot Act is say you are a
terrorist or a threat to national security... and he doesn't have to release the
"evidence" he convicted you on -- meaning he doesn't have to prove it!
The FBI has not just used the powers the USA Patriot Act
gives it to catch terrorists, either. The Act has been used to
affect drug trafficking, money laundering and other crimes unrelated to
terrorism. Remember the Nazis? They were extremely effective at catching criminals...
but it also became a crime to be Jewish, a Jehovah's Witness, a homosexual
and so many other things.
With the Patriot act, the government can drop in on your public library and get the
records of every book you've ever checked out. They can call your internet
service provider (ISP) and get every website you've ever been to. And they can
do all this without
your knowledge. If your librarian even tells you, she can get arrested! As
Jennifer Van Bergen said, this Act would be better called The Shred-the-Constitution Act.
If allowing my privacy to be trampled on and letting my
Constitutional rights become privileges means that I am a Patriot, then a
Patriot is not a
thing I want to be.
Much love,
8Dyay8D
Sources:
The USA Patriot ACT: Bad for Jews, Bad for Immigrants, Bad for Americans, by Noah
Leavitt, Advocacy Director, Jewish Council on Urban Affairs
Repeal the US Patriot Act, by Jennifer Van Bergen
Grabbing New Powers, by Nicole Colson
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