conservator writes “A report by USA Today of its recent poll of Americans’ perceptions of the Patriot Act states, inter alia, that the ACLU’s strategy regarding the Patriot Act (“besides targeting Ashroft”) is based largely on “revisiting battles it lost when Congress authorized covert wiretaps in criminal cases in 1968, and when it created a secret court in 1978 to oversee domestic spy probes”; that the ACLU Web site “glosses over legal standards for subpoenas, warrants and wiretaps that were set decades ago and makes it seem that the Patriot Act created them”; and that when the ACLU says that FBI agents can spy on people “because they don’t like” the books they read or the Web sites they visit, it ignores the fact that the Patriot Act includes language–on the books since 1978–barring the FBI from investigating U.S. citizens “solely” for First Amendment free-speech activities. USA Today also states that its poll “suggests that Americans trust Ashcroft more than the ACLU to balance national security and civil liberties.”
When they learn what is in the act, many Americans find some of the details unsettling. The USA TODAY survey of 501 adults Feb. 16-17 found that 71% disapprove of a section that allows agents to delay telling people that their homes have been secretly searched.
Re: 71% disapprove of a section
Blake, the concern mentioned in the section of the article that you have added would actually fall under “legal standards for subpoenas, warrants and wiretaps that were set decades ago” from the article.
Heather Mac Donald writes regarding so-called “sneak-and-peak” searches and Section 213 of the Patriot Act:
“These critics pretend not to know that, long before anyone imagined such a thing as Islamic terrorism, federal judges have been granting ‘sneak-and-peak’ warrants in criminal cases under identical standards to those of section 213. The possibility of seeking delayed notice is a long-standing law enforcement prerogative, sanctioned by numerous courts. Section 213 merely codified the case law to make the process uniform across different jurisdictions. Portraying section 213 as a new power is simple falsehood, and portraying it as an excessive and unnecessary power is extraordinarily ignorant. Delayed notice under life-threatening conditions is not just reasonable but absolutely imperative.”
Re: 71% disapprove of a section
Er, if it’s already been in use and in law, why did they feel they had to codify it in the Pat. Act? Sounds sorta like they wanted to make it appeal proof somehow.
And it’s not a conservative vs. liberal issue as the original article gave the impression. Lots of conservatives don’t like the PA either, because they want to conserve and limit the power of gov’t.D =12634&c=206 for those keeping score at home.
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?I
one more thing
Lots of librarians know now that the Ashcroft claim “[T]hat the “libraries” provision hadn’t been used.” is a lie. Word on the library street is out there, but of course you won’t find anyone anxious to be quoted about it, since it would break the law to do so.
Re:one more thing
You isolate your assertion from any possible challenge.
Re:one more thing
yup.
Re:one more thing
Pretty sweet deal, isn’t it? The law makes it a crime to say when you’ve had to turn over records so when the government seizes records under the Act, they can say it never happened and anyone it has happened to is forbidden to say it did. Then when dissidents and assorted radicals who have every reason to not trust the government question the government’s assertions, you can sit there and demand proof it would clearly be illegal to show.
Yes, sir. A very sweet deal all around.
Re:one more thing
He didn’t “question assertions.” He said librarians “know” it’s a lie. How did he hear this, if it can’t be demonstrated to me? You are refuting him, not me.
I may limit my participation to the first couple levels of discussion. This back-and-forth is just a waste of time.