Patriot Act losing steam?

[SteveA]

PATRIOT Agonistes
Bad law loses steam as Americans reassert their freedom

http://www.reason.com/hod/dw011906.shtml

You can read the full thing, but the first two paragraphs are great:

"It was like a Peanuts cartoon where Lucy decided not to grab Charlie Brown's football. Last month, a bill to make permanent 16 privacy-shredding provisions of PATRIOT Act arrived in the Senate for an expected "yea" vote. Civil libertarians had watched "anti-terror" laws sail through Congress since the PATRIOT Act passed 98-1 four years ago, and the steamroller wasn't going to up and stop.

And then, it stopped. Thanks to a filibuster led by Idaho Republican Larry Craig and Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold, the permanent extensions hit a reef, lawmakers scrambled to pass a temporary extension, and a final reckoning was delayed until February 3. The PATRIOT Act isn't dead, but that it's got to face more bickering and amending before it can pass again is a genuine surprise. It's the strongest, most satisfying evidence yet that Americans are coming back to their pre-9/11 ideas about freedom and privacy.

..."

I give a standing ovation to Larry Craig and Russ Feingold. Thank you both. Now if some of this had been happened 4 years ago ... but you can't look at gift horse in the mouth (or is it truly returning a stolen horse? )

[Milton Bradley]

It is near election time again, so the "percieved" lesser evil has to do a few things to get the voters away from the greater evil.Don't go out on a limb, and assume these guys really care one way, or the other. This is just more political maneuvering to keep the two headed beast looking like the only options.

[Osborn F Enready]

Well said Milton, and I agree.

[PatrickHenry]

I am happy these two men had enough courage to resist the Bush Administration and its tyranny. I choose to overlook their party affiliation and focus on their fortitude.

[Clarence]

Quote by: PatrickHenry I choose to overlook their party affiliation and focus on their fortitude.

second that. I think that to resist the agenda may actually endanger your life. It could all be a show and they need time for attention to die down and slip something worse in there. I don't know though kinda cynical of me.

[SteveA]

Quote by: Clarence second that. I think that to resist the agenda may actually endanger your life. It could all be a show and they need time for attention to die down and slip something worse in there. I don't know though kinda cynical of me.

Count me in as being cynical. I have a feeling they're trying to pacify things but either way I still give kudos to these two guys. (I intentionally erased the party affiliations after their names when I cut and pasted it because ... that's how it should be)

[Milton Bradley]

Quote by: SteveA (I intentionally erased the party affiliations after their names when I cut and pasted it because ... that's how it should be)

Now that is funny.


[sarcasm] Obviously my cinicism shows through my courageous attempts to suppress my oposition. [/sarcasm]


While I like what I am hearing, I still think its the old Washington two step. Twenty five years of watching C-SPAN has a way of turning a man into a skeptic, and a conspiracy theorist. (..., and a cynic, an outraged citizen, an unrepresented voice, a disenfranchised voter, a marginalized opinion, and an advocate of sweeping change.) Too bad I do not believe that is what we are really seeing.)

[xyzer]

For all the BS I hear about infringements of civil liberties under the provisions of Patriot Act I don't get much in the way of specifice instances. One professor from Saudi Arabia(a non citizen) was tried for possible terrorist ties..but aquitted. This flies in the face
of supposed mistreatment of non citizens..He was given a trial under our legal system which is the way it should be under the rule of law which some say is threatened..

We heard dark suggestions that our library freedoms would be infringed..no examples of problems resulted?
We heard all sorts of petty criticisms which lacked any reference to the fact we are at war. Our enemy has never backed away from saying it will attack and destroy us. And yet as the 9/11 evidence grows dimmer we have more complaints about WHAT MIGHT BE and about what is POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS TO OUR LIBERTIES than we have had evidence that many have been adversly affected by the Patriot Act.The usual sensationalized rubbish!.
So here we go again..Democrat Demagogues and protestors are still trying to drag us back into danger. Drag us back to peacetime rules during a war? Enough already!

[Osborn F Enready]

Nice new pom poms there XYZ'er.

[SteveA]

Quote by: xyzer For all the BS I hear about infringements of civil liberties under the provisions of Patriot Act I don't get much in the way of specifice instances. One professor from Saudi Arabia(a non citizen) was tried for possible terrorist ties..but aquitted. This flies in the face of supposed mistreatment of non citizens..He was given a trial under our legal system which is the way it should be under the rule of law which some say is threatened..

Well then is there any need to claim a need for those provisions then? Haven't we already had a legal system able to try and sentence people? I haven't read the Patriot Act in detail (who has) but what you're saying is that we can still try people under the current system without needing to add the Patriot Act.

We heard dark suggestions that our library freedoms would be infringed..no examples of problems resulted? We heard all sorts of petty criticisms which lacked any reference to the fact we are at war. Our enemy has never backed away from saying it will attack and destroy us. And yet as the 9/11 evidence grows dimmer we have more complaints about WHAT MIGHT BE and about what is POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS TO OUR LIBERTIES than we have had evidence that many have been adversly affected by the Patriot Act.The usual sensationalized rubbish!.

9/11 wasn't a war in any typical sense. Yes, it will fade in importance. Sorry man, we can't keep living like it was still 9/12.

So here we go again..Democrat Demagogues and protestors are still trying to drag us back into danger. Drag us back to peacetime rules during a war? Enough already!

Why not declare martial law, let Bush ignore the Constitution and arrest Democrats then. They're more of a threat to Americans than terrorists, right?

[underbear1]

I wish the Senate felt as strongly against Alito as they did against the Patriot Act, what difference will it make once Cheney and Bush are unimpeachable, the "new" presidential powers they "discover they had all along", (gosh that Alberto Gonzales is a helpful lil' fella)will be MUCH worse than any Patriot Act provision.

[xyzer]

Steve..

I haven't read the Patriot Act in detail (who has) but what you're saying is that we can still try people under the current system without needing to add the Patriot Act.

No I am not. I am saying we are trying to mix peacetime criminal rules under the 4th Amendment with the conduct of a war. We are using electronic surveillance not so much to use the evidence against US criminals as we are to try to PREVENT ATTACKS by foreign terrorist who have declared war against us!

All this nonsensical yelling by the Democrat Demagogues avoids that issue. It avoids the reality of the current war against terrorists and it fails to realize just what this surveillamce consists of...i.e. we hear of wire taps? Not so!
What we are doing and have been doing is catching electronic signals

emitted by cell phones owned by know terrorists and screening them for information to prevent the attacks which they claim they intend to make. This has been going on for years and is reflected in the FISA Statute. Read this

Congress knew about it and so did the NSA during previous administrations.

The political rhetoric coming from some on this forum and leftists elsewhere is mixng peacetime criminal approaches with a wartime attempt to expose enemy intelligence that might reveal attempts to attack us. Read this for better understanding.!ACCOUNT

[SteveA]

Quote by: xyzer Steve.. No I am not. I am saying we are trying to mix peacetime criminal rules under the 4th Amendment with the conduct of a war. We are using electronic surveillance not so much to use the evidence against US criminals as we are to try to PREVENT ATTACKS by foreign terrorist who have declared war against us!

There have always been terrorists. This isn't a new war, or is it a war in any typical sense and even in Iraq we aren't really at war any more. These are police actions. We declared a War or Poverty also but that didn't give give anyone the right to spy on poor people.

All this nonsensical yelling by the Democrat Demagogues avoids that issue.

What? Are they talking about the Constitution and protected rights etc.? Is that all bogus garbage in your opinion? If you want to be spied on why not go to a different country where everyone agrees with you that it's ok?

It avoids the reality of the current war against terrorists

Last time I checked around the neighborhood I didn't see any terrorists. Whose reality are we talking about?

and it fails to realize just what this surveillamce consists of...i.e. we hear of wire taps? Not so! What we are doing and have been doing is catching electronic signals emitted by cell phones owned by know terrorists and screening them for information to prevent the attacks which they claim they intend to make. This has been going on for years and is reflected in the FISA Statute. Read this Congress knew about it and so did the NSA during previous administrations. The political rhetoric coming from some on this forum and leftists elsewhere is mixng peacetime criminal approaches with a wartime attempt to expose enemy intelligence that might reveal attempts to attack us. Read this for better understanding.!ACCOUNT

Well I have less problems with passive sensing than intrusive entry into a system but look at the back of a cordless device sometime and tell me why they say that they comply with the FCC requirement that they must receive and accept interference that's even disruptive to the operation of the device? They pressure for back doors into software and regulating virus protection industries. Government specifically claims patents and other rights over encryption and loation technologies so this isn't truly a passive system as you attempt to imply.

I read the article and have no idea how burdensome FISA might be, but consider that they already made this a relatively secret court that was specifically designed to handle this type of affair. If it's beaurocratic or corrupt that wouldn't be anything new. We really don't have an option to simply toss out the Constitution though, and especially it's not up to Bush himself to simply decide to ignore it. What can I say? That's how things work here and we did fine before George came along. Have you considered that a lot of the reason we've been a focus for terrorists hasn't been because we had a government of limited powers that didn't get tangled up in foreign affairs, but instead because we have a large government that does tend to simply ignore the Constitution and get us messed up in a lot of things we shouldn't have been involved in?

You could spin this a ton of ways, but keep in mind that 1) terrorism has been around for ages 2) terrorism is largely motivated by state crimes and 3) if we're never able to realize when a task is finished, we'll continue to blow resources on it. We can only try to deter these acts but truly they tend to stem from perceived injustices. There is currently no continent in the world that's composed of simply crazy people (maybe some areas have an unusually large number of borderline ones though?).

The only way to really address terrorism is to either 1) convince general populaces to oppose the practice (though using methods that incite terrorism won't help) or 2) get down and dirty and begin the slaughter. I have little of any sympathy for people that resort to #2 needlessly. This is a war of CHOICE!!!!!!!!!! There's no denying that we didn't have to be there in Iraq, and what you blow off as "liberal propoganda" has been more factual than the stuff Bush has claimed and whether or not to authorize spying on Americans isn't simply a choice free to be made by him. And the day he decides he doesn't have to follow the Constitution and laws in the U.S. is the day he's no longer legitimately the President. Sorry, he doesn't own the place.

[Osborn F Enready]

Well said Steve, and I completely agree.

XYZ'er and other folks with that point of view need to understand as long as more than one man exists, terror in some shape or form will exist.

The "War on Drugs" is a war that will never be won, and the "War" on terror is even more laughable.

[RickSp]

Patriot Act Talks Hit Roadblock On Privacy Issue

The main disagreements center on provisions that allow FBI agents to obtain records on terrorism suspects, who have very limited options for challenging such searches. Specter has said the law allows adequate "judicial review" of proposed searches. But Sununu and his allies say the law makes it virtually impossible for targeted people to prevail, even if they have no ties to terrorism.

Never been a big fan of Sununu, but I might yet change my mind.

[Rainbow]

http://www.reason.com/hod/dw011906.shtml

Last month, a bill to make permanent 16 privacy-shredding provisions of PATRIOT Act arrived in the Senate for an expected "yea" vote. Civil libertarians had watched "anti-terror" laws sail through Congress since the PATRIOT Act passed 98-1 four years ago, and the steamroller wasn't going to up and stop. And then, it stopped. Thanks to a filibuster led by Idaho Republican Larry Craig and Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold, the permanent extensions hit a reef, lawmakers scrambled to pass a temporary extension, and a final reckoning was delayed until February 3. The PATRIOT Act isn't dead, but that it's got to face more bickering and amending before it can pass again is a genuine surprise. It's the strongest, most satisfying evidence yet that Americans are coming back to their pre-9/11 ideas about freedom and privacy.

I think that the "Patriot Act" is going to re-appear in a different shape and/or combination of Acts that put together would re-activate the original "Patriot Act" and/or its some essential factors, in reality.