Quote of the Day: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” – Fourth Amendment to the Constitution
Forty-five days after 9/11, Congress passed the USA PATRIOT Act without reading it. This new law was supposed to protect you from terrorism, but it has really left you unprotected against lawless federal agents.
The Patriot Act contains numerous violations of the Fourth Amendment. It gives federal agents vast new powers that have been abused to investigate innocent Americans.
In 2001 and 2006 concerned members of Congress urged expiration dates on some of the Patriot Act’s most controversial powers. Regrettably, Congress has constantly renewed those powers, despite a multitude of FBI abuses. Last year, the extension was passed with just a voice vote!
Now, another expiration is at hand — February 28, 2011. Unfortunately, Rep. Mike Rogers, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has introduced H.R. 67 to renew the provisions for another year.
Like many free Americans who want to stay that way, I was at a Tea Party rally on April 15th. I’m not a card-carrying member of that group but I agree with them wholeheartedly on the bad direction this country is taking under the Obama regime. So I picked a spot on the sidewalk on Menaul Boulevard at 4 in the afternoon, brandished my sign, yelled a bit, waved a bit, and said what had to be said. For the most part, the event was very, very peaceful except for a young lady who stopped at the light and tried to share the water she had with her in her environmentally-friendly and recyclable water bottle. I was deeply dismayed for it appeared she was far more in need of a shower than any of us.
But it is the difference between conservatives and those on the Left that we tend not to make horse’s rear ends of ourselves at rallies and protests. I don’t think I’ve ever read of a single conservative riot, no angry mobs of grown-ups running down the street overturning cars, setting fire to buildings, breaking windows, pillaging, and looting. But every time I see rallies on the Left, there they are obstructing traffic, breaking things, making their presence known through obscene gestures and foul language. None of that was in evidence at this day’s Tea Party protest.
We voiced our opinions on Mr. Obama, federal spending, politicians who won’t listen to us, liberty, freedom, the Constitution, you name it, we wrote it on out signs and discussed it with one another as the time passed. A finer group of people I could never find myself around. Thoughtful, opinionated, and, most importantly, intelligent.
We came, we made our point, and if the powers that be still won’t take notice of what we have to say, they’ll hear from us again this November.
WASHINGTON, DC – Just three days before the USA PATRIOT Act was to expire, Congress used a backdoor method to camouflage the stripping away of civil liberties until after the 2010 election. The bill, HR 3961, was originally passed by the House last fall as the Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act. While the Republocrats originally wanted to add the PATRIOT Act reauthorization to the so-called* “jobs” bill, some dissent on the jobs portion by some Republicans and on the PATRIOT portion by some Democrats delayed the bill, so Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) had to resort to the backdoor amendment of HR 3961.
A few weeks ago at CPAC, a Friday panel was assembled to answer the question: “Does security trump freedom?” Among the panelists were Robert “Skip” Ash, who teaches a course on “national security law” at Regent University, and also serves at the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) as their Senior Litigation Counsel for National Security Law. The deck was stacked beforehand: The ACLJ claims to be “focused on National Security issues and waging an effective and constitutional war on terrorism” (Constitutional? What Constitution?), and the debate moderator was Jay Sekulow, who serves as the organization’s Chief Counsel.
In his opening statements to the audience, Ash commented: “[The troops] also wonder why the President of the United States cannot bring himself to admit that the United States is in a long-term war with enemy jihadists, who seek to destroy us.” Several panelists, including the chief architect of the Patriot Act, went on to defend the Patriot Act as a set of wartime powers necessary to protecting freedom; as former Attorney General John Ashcroft had explained earlier in the day, “the purpose of security is to reinforce and enhance freedom.” Or, as George Orwell famously listed as a slogan of “the Party:” Freedom is Slavery.
To this, the short response is: If these “wartime powers” are so essential to maintain America’s national security and the freedoms of its citizens, why not declare a war? The heart of the matter, of course, runs much deeper. As Glenn Greenwald wrote in his New York Times bestseller, How Would A Patriot Act?, the goal is not to uphold or defend the Constitution at all, but rather to utilize fear to undermine it: Read More »
But if you do that you’ll think we’ve sent you to the wrong link. You’ll see that the title on the bill is “Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act.”
You see, H.R. 3961 originally started with that title and subject, and it passed the House in November. Then, this past Wednesday, Majority Leader Harry Reid ripped the guts out of the bill and replaced it with the Patriot extensions. The Senate then passed that version of the bill and sent it back to the House, where it was approved Thursday night.
Now, you may be asking, where’s the link to the Senate roll call vote?
Well, there isn’t one. The bill passed by Unanimous Consent, which means a voice vote.
Everything about this process and bill is offensive to DownsizeDC.org . . .
* changing the subject of the bill by amendment violates our One Subject At A Time Act
* there was no 7-day waiting period before votes in either chamber, violating our requirements in the Read the Bills Act
* Congress neither let the provisions expire (our preference), nor reformed the Patriot Act for greater accountability and civil liberties protections
Instead of letting these unneeded provisions lapse, Congress will likely extend them, perhaps 30 days, or maybe to the end of 2010. BUT THIS COULD HAPPEN AS SOON AS TODAY.
Worse, Congressional leaders will probably insert this extension in unrelated legislation. This is cowardly. This issue deserves an up-or-down vote on its own merits (or lack thereof).
Three provisions of the PATRIOT ACT are due to expire at the end of this month. These provisions are . . .
1. Business Records: allows searches on your personal data without your knowledge if the FBI convinces a judge it is “relevant” to a terrorism investigation. The data could be computer-related, financial, medical, or even your library check-out history 2. Lone Wolf: allows the federal government to spy on a foreign person with no known ties to a foreign government or terrorist group — a power that’s never been used 3. Roving Wiretap: allows federal agents to intercept phone conversations without having to specify the person being investigated or which phone is being used
The House and Senate can’t seem to agree on reforming the Patriot Act. They might, however, agree on another temporary renewal of these provisions for 2-6 months.
Liberty Maven
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