My Congressman, Peter DeFazio voted against the Patriot Act.
by: members of the Lane County Bill of Rights Defense Committee
On October 26, 2001, the U.S. Bill of Rights became effectively void and prohibited by a new law – the USA PATRIOT Act. USA PATRIOT is an acronym for Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. The word “patriot” was used to coerce most members of Congress to vote for the bill in the fearful aftermath of September 11.
Only 66 members of Congress mustered the courage to vote against this freedom-eroding bill, including Oregon Congressman Peter DeFazio, who said on the House floor October 12, 2001, “This is not the way to defend liberty and fight terrorism. I fear that this bill, since I do not know what is in it, could be the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution for civil liberties, rather than the tools our law enforcement agencies really need.”
DeFazio refers to the Gulf of Tonkin, which was a government lie, perpetrated to convince the Congress to vote for increased military action in Vietnam. We all know how that war turned out. Hundreds of thousands of Americans marched in the streets to end that war, after they learned of U.S. atrocities against the Vietnamese, and after too many of their sons and husbands returned home in body bags.
Hundreds of thousands have not yet assembled in the streets to protest the death of the Bill of Rights via the USA PATRIOT Act. But as the Lane County Bill of Rights Defense Committee petitions in the streets of Eugene, Springfield and Lane County, we realize a rapidly growing number of people are eager to sign a petition to convince their local governments to pass resolutions opposing the USA PATRIOT Act and recent Executive and Military orders.
U.S. Assistant Attorney General Chris Cardani was quoted at length in a Register Guard article on Friday, October 26, about all the reasons why the USA PATRIOT Act is your friend. He says it’s there to help you. To that, we say, “Another government lie, delivered by a paid government messenger.”
Anyone who remembers the 1950s, 60s and 70s, can tell you that law enforcement already tried spying on the public. In fact, in April 1976, Congress outlawed their wiretapping and COINTELPRO-operations. The Final Report of the U.S. Senate Committee studying intelligence activities states, “The crescendo of improper intelligence activity in the latter part of the 1960s and 1970s shows what we must watch out for: In time of crisis, the Government will exercise its power to conduct domestic intelligence activities to the fullest extent. The distrinction between legal dissent and criminal conduct is easily forgotten. Our job is to recommend means to help ensure that the distinction will always be observed.” Once again, law enforcement seeks to trample the safeguards of our freedoms. This time in the name of terrorism.
If our Bill of Rights must be sacrificed to fight terrorism, we submit it is too great a price for a free people to pay. And we submit it is not necessary to fight terrorism by eroding our Constitutional guarantees such as right to a speedy and public trial, right to have evidence presented before we are subjected to search and seizure, right to be told what the charges are against us, and right to due process.
Mr. Cardani and other law enforcement officials apparently think the American people will believe them when they say this is all for our own good, and law enforcement won’t lie to us. But even the FISA Court knows better than that. FISA stands for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It’s a secretive federal court that approves spying on terror suspects in the U.S.
On May 17, the court alleged that the Justice Department and FBI officials lied to the court in more than 75 applications for search warrants and wiretaps. The Court refused to give the Justice Department broad new powers because of these lies. The Court said that law enforcement also improperly shared intelligence information with agents and prosecutors handling criminal cases in New York at least four times. These are not new allegations. The misrepresentations go back as far as 2000. Imagine how much more shoddy the Justice Department’s practices have become since the USA PATRIOT Act was signed into law! They have so much carte blanche to “sneak and peek,” to search bookstore purchases, library records, medical, financial, educational records on their mission to prove these new freedoms they’ve acquired will lead to terrorist arrests. Why should they be careful? According to the FISA Court, they’re not.
The underlying, unspoken reasoning behind Mr. Cardani’s assessment of the USA PATRIOT Act is, `we are the Government; trust us to do the right thing.’ History does not always support this notion. What Mr. Cardani uses to support his premise is predictably those instances where the USA PATRIOT Act has been most effective. What the government will not tell you, and what the USA PATRIOT Act does not require the government to report to you are those instances where the Act was used against Americans, where citizens were searched, their privacy invaded, their reputations sullied, and no criminal activity was uncovered.
For example, the USA PATRIOT Act adopts much of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to be available against ordinary citizens.. FISA was initially adopted to protect America from foreign intelligence espionage, and under that premise allowed the Justice Department to conduct surveillance and searches of foreign intelligence agents outside the scope of Constitutional privacy and search and seizure law, including a secret Court called the FISA court. One instance of this is the USA PATRIOT Act, at 215,amends current law 50 USC 1862 to allow application to the FISA Court for an Order to compel production of any business records from any one for any investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities. This sounds laudable and what any reasonable citizen would want the government to do to protect us, except when you read the fine print:
1) No showing need be made that the person is an agent of a foreign power;
2) The Court MUST grant the order if the required elements are listed.
3) The Order will NOT say it was issued under this Section;
4) Person served by the Order (employers, telecommunication companies, banks, etc.) Are prohibited from revealing there is such an order;
5) no reporting of items seized or their usefulness reported to the Court or Congress.
The implications are staggering. Secret Courts issuing Secret Orders to Secret Police to secretly peer into the personal and financial privacy of Americans. All with little or no showing of danger, and all with no method of accountability. This type of warrant is similarly applicable to education records (amends 20 USC 1232; Sect 507-8 USAPA), computer records (USAPA 216 amends 18 USC 3121(c)), and telecommunication records (USAPA 505 allows for search of some records without court order).
The impact on computer surveillance and the inclusion of computer activity as `terrorist’ is equally disturbing. Without requiring any court order, but by mere virtue of a unilateral subpoena, someone in Mr. Cardani’s position may acquire a detailed analysis of an American’s Internet uses including session times and durations, temporarily assigned network (I..P.) addresses, means and source of payments including credit card numbers and bank account numbers and locations. There is of course a prohibition against anyone served with such a subpoena from informing the subject of the subpoena. And of course there is less reporting requirements than required above since the subpoenas originate in the office of the United States Attorney and all information derived therefrom remains there. Mr. Cardani needs to answer whether or not he will subject all subpoenas generated by him, or his office to public inspection to determine the breadth of scope of governmental intrusions into our lives.
There is also the well known `sneak and peek’ provision allowing law enforcement to obtain a search warrant and search any American’s residence and effects, without ever informing the subject of the search. Besides the obvious secret and shadowy nature of sneaking around an American’s home and effects, this also prevents anyone from ever challenging what the government has stated about them in order to obtain the warrant. Was it false? Was it political? Was there probable cause of criminal activity? One will never know
This sort of lack of accountability is the core difference between Mr. Cardani’s analysis and our own. Mr. Cardani’s statement that only the rights of criminals will be impinged is not supported by the Act’s absence of any Reporting of ALL citizens whose rights were violated.
Further, when Mr. Cardani states, “The USA PATRIOT Act gives us tools to better hunt them down. No question about that..” this too is without substantiation. Senator Feingold, when voting against the Act, stated the government made no showing the reasons they failed to detect the planing of recent attacks or any other terrorist attacks were the civil liberties compromised by this Act. As we have since learned the government already had the tools available to prevent the attacks but failed to properly utilize them; Search Warrants were not applied for on Mr. Mouusarri, internal memoranda were ignored advising of flight schools, surveillance was not followed up on. The tools of which Mr. Cardani speaks were already there.
It is no surprise that those who search and peer into the privacy of Americans would welcome any opportunity to do so further. It is also no surprise Americans would want more accountability from their government, and would challenge any law which allows for less accountability while simultaneously granting broader authority. |
