A look at the blatant attack on our Freedoms in the name of “National Security” and the “War on Terror”
I’m sure many of you know about the REAL ID Act that has tried to transform our Driver’s Licenses (something everyone needs) into a form of identification for our biometric data to be stored by private companies and to keep tabs on all Americans. Through a huge grassroots effort, over half the states have stood up against this intrusion into our privacy and have shot down the REAL ID.
Of course these types of bills are always being done in the name of “security” and “the war on terror”. How interesting that we are fighting a war not against a country or even a single group but against an “IDEA”. Because it is a war on an abstract concept it can go on forever with no real definition of victory. There will always be some terror threat so I guess we will forever be at war. What’s more, it has enabled the President to claim war time powers without the approval of Congress.
This ideological war gives the Executive branch full authority without the oversight of Congress to declare Martial Law and strip us of our freedoms “for our own good of course”. It allows hundreds of billions of dollars of Taxpayer money to be shifted to the Military Industrial Complex and privately owned International companies for war time efforts. It allows warrantless searches and surveillance to be done on any and all Americans by the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978 was set up to make sure this power wasn’t abused. It was the required oversight needed to protect the people from those who get corrupt with power.
But the House and Senate approved an Amendment to this bill on August 3rd 2007 which permits the Government, with no court oversight whatsoever, to intercept the communications of calls to and from the United States, as long as it is directed at a person — any person, not a suspected terrorist — reasonably believed to be outside the United States. That means giving free rein to the Government to wiretap anyone, including U.S. citizens who live overseas, service members such as those in Iraq, journalists reporting from overseas, or even Members of Congress who are overseas and call home to the United States. This is without any court oversight whatsoever. With no oversight and totalitarian authority, do you think the Government will only use this power to fight terror? They now have the authority to spy on political rivals or any American that stands up against them.
Oh, this bill (like most) pays lip service to protecting abuse that really just provides the illusion that it doesn’t violate our civil rights. It goes far beyond the identified problem of foreign-to-foreign communications. It goes far, far beyond the public descriptions of the President’s warrantless wiretapping program.
What little judicial review the bill DOES provide is essentially meaningless. The FISA Court would decide only whether the Government has put reasonable procedures in place to direct surveillance against people reasonably believed to be abroad. That is basically a standard that is nothing more than a rubber stamp. It ignores the real issue which is protecting the rights of Americans who may be calling or e-mailing friends, family, or business partners overseas and who have done absolutely nothing wrong.
Yes my friends, your emails can be monitored for any reason they want. Even if this authority was is meant to be used for foreign communication surveillance, there is nothing to keep them from monitoring domestic communication as well.
Of course they continually bring up 9/11 and al-Qaida as the “terror” we should be ever afraid of. The secret fear that we should all be worried about every second of every day. The fear that only the “GOVERNMENT” can save us from. The same fear and terror that the Government CREATED with its own foreign policies.
Then there is the new and IMPROVED PATRIOT ACT. The original version was opportunistically pushed through Congress shortly after 9/11 without any Senator reading the bill and with amendment requests to the final version being ignored. Unfortunately, it allows the Executive branch to gain even more control and move toward a police state.
But this new 2007 version now forces all companies to hand over all data on ANYONE for ANY REASON to Homeland Security and the FBI (yes, no judicial oversight) while being completely isolated of liability. They could also enforce indefinite gag orders so that if they tell anyone that they were even contacted by Homeland Security, they can be jailed. A Federal District Judge in New York deemed this action to be unconstitutional (though these threats are still used anyway to this day).
But the damage was done and some of these companies were getting sued by this unauthorized release of personal records, bank statements, medical records, what websites you’ve been to, your emails, what searches you’ve done online, etc. Many of these companies that were cooperating (through force) with the Government are in class action lawsuits.
Well, the new Patriot Act that passed in Congress, among other things, removes all liability from these companies. Furthermore, this provision is retroactive so anything they’ve done it the past will be free from liability as well. How helpful in the name of “security” huh?
It further dismantles court review of surveillance such as getting rid of court-approved limits on police spying on religious and political activity. Eliot Spitzer was caught by the Patriot Act by the way… you know, the one that is suppose to catch terrorists. This would be very useful to take out political rivals wouldn’t it?
Oh but its just getting started…. it allows the Government to operate in secret by authorizing secret arrests, torture, and indefinite detention of ANY American for ANY reason without trial or even an explanation of why they are detained. It also expands the definition of “terrorism” so that organizations engaged in civil disobedience are at risk of government wiretapping, asset seizure, and their supporters could even risk losing their citizenship (yes, even if you were born here). Luckily Martin Luther King Jr. isn’t around today. He would most certainly be a “terrorist” under the new definition. Oh wait… he was assassinated wasn’t he? I guess that’s another way to handle true Patriots.
It also unfairly targets immigrants under the pretext of fighting terrorism by stripping even lawful immigrants of the right to a fair deportation hearing and stripping the federal courts of their power to correct unlawful actions by the immigration authorities.
Under current law, the Executive Branch may only extradite Americans or others to face trial in foreign courts if an extradition treaty, ratified by the United States Senate, specifies that the crime is one for which extradition is allowed. Likewise, the Executive Branch may not conduct searches and wiretaps on behalf of a foreign government which is investigating a foreign crime unless the Senate has approved a “Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty.” Under the new PATRIOT ACT, now extradition is allowed without a treaty or in excess of limits imposed by existing treaties, and so are foreign-directed searches and wiretaps.
By writing the Senate out of the process of defining the limits of our legal relationships with other governments, the bill discards an important protection against subjecting American citizens to the control of possibly dictatorial governments. At the same time, the bill further strips away judicial power by preventing the courts from questioning an extradition request, even for an American citizen, even if the court were to find that the requesting country’s legal system fails to respect fundamental civil and human rights.
Under an existing, overbroad definition of international and domestic “terrorism,” any individual or group that breaks the law with the intent of influencing the government can be labeled a terrorist if their activities are “dangerous to human life.” Under that definition, diverse “direct-action” organizations, including Operation Rescue, the World Trade Organization protestors, and others could conceivably be labeled “terrorist organizations.”
Patriot Act 2 not only fails to fix this definition, it exacerbates these problems by hinging even more anti-terrorism powers to this definition. These include new wiretapping authority (secs. 120, 121), civil asset forfeiture powers (sec. 427, 428), new death penalties (sec. 411), and a frightening and unprecedented power for the government to revoke American citizenship even of native-born Americans (sec. 501).
Under these new powers, an overzealous Attorney General in an Administration that favored abortion rights could label a pro-life organization that engaged in “direct action” as a domestic terrorist group. As a consequence, the government could wiretap their meetings, seize their property, and strip their supporters of United States citizenship, rendering them in the same position as stateless undocumented immigrants who face potentially indefinite detention.
The entire PURPOSE of the Patriot Act has nothing to do with fighting terrorism which is an abstract term anyway. It is the process of using FEAR to grant the Executive branch COMPLETE control by eliminating the Checks and Balances of the Constitution and replacing it with unfettered power. These new powers make it even harder for professional law enforcement agents to resist pressure by political leaders to implement highly visible policies that violate civil liberties, rather than rely on proven techniques that are effective.
Then there is the new bill called the Homegrown Terrorist Prevention Act - H.R. 1955 (they love given these names that make it sound like they are really protecting us) was passed overwhelmingly 400 to 6 in the House. It’s real intent is to herald a new government crackdown on dissident activity under the guise of fighting terrorism.
The bill would establish two government-appointed bodies to study, monitor and propose ways of curbing what it calls homegrown terrorism and extremism in the United States. The first body, a National Commission, would convene for eighteen months. A university-based “Center for Excellence” would follow, bringing together academic specialists to recommend laws and other measures.
The bill’s definition of “extremism” and “terrorism” is too vague and its mandate even more broad. Under a false veil of expertise and independence, the government-appointed commissions could be used as ideological cover to push through harsher laws. Yes, even harsher than Patriot Act 2.
But THAT’S JUST THE BEGINNING, you didn’t think they would stop there did you?
Take these bills that I’ve already described and lets add in H.R. 5405 that was just proposed this week. It is labeled the “Social Security Identity Theft Prevention Act” but is effectively really the “Social Security Surveillance Act”. It attempts to do what REAL ID could not, which is get every single American into a database where all of their information can be tracked. Under the guise of protecting seniors and our “national security”, Congressman Mark Kirk of
The new card card will retain the standard features of the Social Security card such as the name and account number of the card holder, but will now include beefed up security measures also commonly used by law enforcement to track criminals, and hackers to falsify and clone sim cards.
The surveillance features of the card include: a digital image displayed of the card holder on the surface of the card and an “encrypted, machine-readable electronic record which shall include records of biometric identifiers unique to the individual to whom the card is issued, including a copy of any digitized facial image printed on the face of the card.”
Manufacturing of the card will be out-sourced to the Department of Homeland Security and utilize the facilities that create the B1/B2 Visa and the Permanent Resident Card.
At a recent
(you can watch that video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrsJVZe41Dg)
The bill clearly states the new surveillance cards are to be issued to social security account holders upon reaching the age of 16.
A proponent, of the new SSS card, asked Kirk, “Can you share what information’s on there that’s freaking everybody out about a national ID card, what’s being stored on there that the Government doesn’t already know?”
He responded, “Just about everything the government already knows.”
Standard operating procedure is in effect here. Using fear tactics on uninformed senior citizens, and the usual excuse of national security in a post 9/11 world, another member of the DC boys club is attempting to slip a national ID card into the hands of a terrified populous. This is another attempt to ratchet down the American people into a coded world of control where being asked for “your papers” is as common as it was in Nazi Germany.
These bills represent a DIRECT ATTACK on our freedoms. MUCH WORSE than any terrorist attack.
The Constitution lays out a separation of powers that puts Congress in charge of making the laws, approving treaties, and declaring war. By splitting power in this way, the Framers ensured that even a popular President could not change the law, declare war, or commit the country to binding international commitments without obtaining the consent of Congress. So much for the Constitution huh? Today it is essentially meaningless and has no authority or recognition whatsoever. It is just a cool historical artifact… nothing more. How sad it is that our great country has come to this, and worse yet, that the PEOPLE don’t even seem to care.
If the cost of defending Freedom and Liberty is to give up our Freedoms and civil rights GUARANTEED to us by the Constitution, then it begs the question, what is it that we are really fighting for? These people have power because we accept that they have power. The time for sitting on your hands and waiting for someone else to solve the problem is OVER.
“The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” - Thomas Jefferson
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