This one comes by way of the AP via Yahoo News…
“The Justice Department has given Congress three dozen examples of how the Patriot Act has been used to prosecute terrorists and other criminals, part of an administration effort to counter criticism that the law does more to harm civil liberties than to protect the nation.
The report did not mention some more controversial powers, such as the FBI’s ability to obtain library and bookstore records in terrorism cases or the so-called “sneak and peek” search warrants in which agents need not immediately tell suspects their home or business had been searched.” Read More.
No public briefings, no renewal
I see from the Yahoo News posting that Ashcroft’s report was for the eyes of the Judiciary committee only. If I’m wrong, someone post a link or public source for the report.
I don’t see how public discussion of the real life situations where specific section of USAPAs have been used could cause harm to terror investigations. We’re not talking sources and methods, we’re talking laws.
Besides, as the administration so often says, “The guilty have nothing to hide.” So if their use of PA sections can’t stand the scrutiny of daylight, it should be stopped.
As for the al-Qaeda person in the library, how are we supposed to know that DOJ needed the PA to find him? After all, the terrorists who would have given us the Millenium plot were foiled by old-fashioned pre-9/11 laws. Like the NRA folks say, sometimes it’s better to enforce existing laws than to create new ones!
Re:No public briefings, no renewal
They’re not really creating new laws, they are streamlining old ones.
People can’t demand better intelligence and then expect any and all of that intelligence to be turned over to the public which would make the intelligence useless.
Re:No public briefings, no renewal
“People can’t demand better intelligence…”
Since we’re talking about the PATRIOT Act, it is worth saying again:
1) 9/11 was about a failure for agencies to share data they already had.
2) The Patriot Act is almost entirely devoted to data collection, with said data going right back to agencies which continued to hoard their dots to the detriment of good intelligence.
We can demand that agencies better use the information they are already collecting before they come to us with new wish lists.
From a more recent LISNews article, I see that DOJ’s report is available, for which I’m grateful. I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but multiple sources say it mentions neither section 215, nor the so-called sneek and peek provisions.
Therefore, if DOJ isn’t finding them useful, those provisions should be repealed. If they are, they need to explain in detail why they are useful and an honest cost-benefit analysis should be done.
As to your other comment:
“They’re not really creating new laws, they are streamlining old ones.”
Many supporters of PA insist at different times that the PA is either an amazing new tool we can’t possible live without or a simple tinkering of old rules. Neither case exempts PA from public scrunity.
I’m willing to bet that the original FISA laws in 78 weren’t debated in secret, coming in on the heels of the Church Commission report. If those could be debated in open congress, then the so-called simple tinkering can be debated in the open.
If it is the radical revision of our laws that I and other opponents believe, then all the more reason that justification and debate take place in sunlight! No changing our basic legal structure in private.
Re:No public briefings, no renewal
What your asking for is a play-by-play on what the Justice Department is doing while fighting terrorism and I don’t believe you will ever get that, nor should you.
And no it wasn’t just about sharing exisiting data. One of the issues that has come up is that better intelligence comes from making contacts from fairly disreputable individuals, something that was stopped in the 90’s. Even if they had shared data the next step would have been to get even more information on the parties the original data was about.
Its Research 101, you have a huge stack of info but you start by looking at little threads here and there. When you find something that looks promising you round up even more information on that specific thread. Which means these provisiosn might have been helpful pre-9/11. If they are not helpful now its because the attack that took years to plan already happened. Doesn’t mean we won’t be in the same situation 5 or 10 years from now.
Re:No public briefings, no renewal
At the risk of fighting the last war — a challenge. Where in the work of the 9/11 commission, or other gov’t published reports on 9/11 are the instances of failing to collect more information – as opposed to failing sharing existing information, sometimes even within a single agency?
I can set several instances of the latter:
Staff Statement No. 2: Three 9/11 Hijackers: Identification, Watchlisting, and Tracking
Examples of CIA not sharing information on known terrorists between HQ and CIA field stations in Indonesia and Thailand. Failure of NSA to share database information with either CIA or FBI counter terror units.
Staff Statement No. 17: Improvising a Homeland Defense
Examples of FAA inability to communicate with military authorities regarding known hijacked aircraft.
It’s true that FBI HQ declined to try for a FISA warrant for Mousouai, citing the difficulty in doing so, but that’s the only case I can think of. I think Mousouai(sp?) has proved himself a madman many times over and probably had no meaningful connection to the rest of the cell.
So, what can you point to? What instance of ungathered, as opposed to uncollated data can you point to that might have helped unravel even a piece of the 9/11 plot?
On another note, it’s important to realize that even giving up rights and the rule of law won’t save you from terror — that’s an every day reality in Russia. Our administration officials from FBI Director Mueller to National Security Adviser Rice are pretty confident their will be additional attacks on the US even with the current set of what I think are overzealous laws. Mueller went as far as to say that suicide bombers were inevitable here.
With the choice being terror with or without limitations on our two century old Bill of Rights, I’ll take freedom. No one said freedom was safe or without cost. If you disagree, fine, but don’t expect any President to keep you safe in exchange for a “temporary surrender” of a “little liberty.”
Re:No public briefings, no renewal
Depends on how you look at it. The general beef was about a lack of intelligence gathering but I believe that relates more to international than within. But you are ignoring the simple fact that had the information been shared it simply would have led to more information gathering. They wouldn’t have gone and arrested any of the suspects. They would have tried to follow their every move in the hopes that it would lead to bigger fish.
As to giving up rights: You can’t get or give up a part of a right. Your records were available before the Patriot Act, they are available now, they will be available if PA section 215 sunsets. The idea that library records should be sacrosanct is a crock.
How they’re gotten makes a difference
“Your records were available before the Patriot Act, they are available now, they will be available if PA section 215 sunsets.”
That’s true, but 215 lowers the threshold under which records can be obtained. It also moves such requests from an open court to a secret court which has granted every search request asked of it. Unless you have a faith in government infalliability, this should make you nervous; for our system of justice, if not yourself.
This is a clear diminishment of the 4th Amendment, which is acknowledged by PA supporters such as Rep Dan Burton. This would be bad enough if it really was “temporary”, but as many people in both parties have said, the War on Terror will last generations and has no publicly discernable victory condition. In its current formulation, it is truly “war without end” and anything that we surrender is surrendered forever.
“The idea that library records should be sacrosanct is a crock.”
Why do you think so, and what do we both mean by library records?
I realized that I’m more zealous about some library records than others. Circulation records to me are absolutely sacrosanct. Partly because “books don’t kill people, people kill people.” Partly because only a mind reader can REALLY know why a particular person checked out a particular book. Partly because the FBI has a documented history of hounding people for what they written, or for what periodicals they’ve subscribed to. Our gov’t has wasted too much time investigating First Amendment activities over the years for me to EVER trust them with circulation records. I would grudingly provide them in response to a court order issued in open court.
Other kinds of library records might be open for discussion.
Broadening the discussion, are there records of any kind you think should be sacrosanct? Or should every single detail about someone’s life be available to Federal authorities on the simple assertion that the information needed is “relevant” to an ongoing investigation?
Re:How they’re gotten makes a difference
Interesting points all but since I’m going on vacation I’m leaving you high and dry. I’ll be back July 26th and I’ll post a reply in my journal.
Enjoy your vacation!
Hope it’s relaxing! – Daniel