Slashdot Mirror
Anti-Patriot Act Movement Expands
MFS! writes "Mount Shasta, California has become the latest city where the USA PATRIOT act is creating a controversy. This story at the Record-Searchlight describes petitioning by a local citizens' rights committee to order police to defy the PATRIOT act. To date, 3 states and 130 cities have passed legislation forbidding local authorities from cooperating with federal PATRIOT requests, not to mention the numerous businesses who are taking pains to hamper the Act's coverage."
I hope this rebellion that these states and cities shake up the US administration. From an outsiders point of view (I'm from the Netherlands) I find the actions taking by the US Administration very shocking. These movements taken by internal states and cities hopefully do them some good.
-- Cliff Albert
Americans have constantly disobeyed laws they viewed as unjust. Starting in revolutionary times with the Boston Tea Party, then moving forward to Henry David Thoreau, prohibition, Eugene Debs running for president from jail in defiance of the Espionage Act, and more recently the civil rights movement (M. L. King,). In this view, disobedience of the Patriot Act is not unique but continuation of this theme in American history
Oregon has an assisted suicide law that was approved by voters twice. Ashcroft decided it should be illegal, and declared that the lethal drugs Oregon doctors can prescribe (under very limited circumstances, of course) serve no legitimate medical purpose and therefore were controlled substances, and instructed the DEA to arrest doctors who prescribed the drugs. It went to the Supreme Court and Ashcroft lost.
One of Oregon's senators - Gordon Smith I think - said he opposes this state law, but he fought for Oregon's right to have it.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
...by the same people that were responsible for the PATRIOT act. Or is it? It's certainly possible that, by posting sentiments of dissent here, one could attract an extra bit of attention from the people that monitor internet communications. Hope you aren't in the habit of downloading "questionable content"...
Losers choose to abuse the use of "loose".
I don't care if they know that I like to read WWII history books and old computer magazines.The only people that would be upset over this are people checking out bomb making books and I don't think libraries stock those anyhow. So how's about everyone just calm down?
While it is nice to assume that the government will do no damage with this information, history has shown otherwise. The patriot act allows them to find out anything about you and me. Tommorrow, the feds may decide that ppl who have ever read byte magazine may be terrorists so they will investigate all who fit that criteria. Or perhaps they will check who has read the quran and start investigations. Look at how hatfill's life is destroyed by being Ashcroft's "person of interest". No proof of any kind, yet destroyed. Look at the musleums still being held in prison for being "ppl of interest". No proof of any type (according to a recently released study) yet still being held.
Now, go back to the time of Reagan, Nixon, or J.E. Hoover. All have used information (or made up stuff) to destroy ppl the same way that Ashcroft now does. the more info that they have, the worse things will get.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I used [Megabank]'s services to pay my tuition bills at [esteemed UK university]. Today, I was called by [megabank] and was told that if I didn't tell them where the funds were coming from that I used to pay my tuition came from, that my accounts would be closed and my case referred to the federal government. While "my personal savings" was a good enough answer for them, good god, what shite.
In defense of [Megabank], they didn't seem to happy to have to make these phone calls, but told me that they were required to by the patriot act. in fact, the woman even spoke frankly that the company saw this as a waste of time and money too.
Ashcroft is such a huge hypocrite (does that make him a hippocrit?) - "States Rights" is his catch-all excuse for supporting states that do what he wants (biggest example is his pro-gun agenda, which I happen to agree with) - but when it comes to laws he doesn't like such as sex, drugs and death (aka gay rights, medical marijuana and assisted suicide), "States Rights" are quickly ushered out of the room.
Another example of his hypocrisy is his former strong opposition to the Clipper chip and statements made supporting the individual's right to privacy. But as soon as he was appointed to office as attorney general all that rhetoric went out the window and he quickly set to dismantling as many privacy rights as he could, and 9/11 only made that crusade easier when he was able to personally draft the USA-PATRIOT act.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
That's it I'm going out and making myself some laws
You were modded funny, but there's actually a truth in there that defines the American character, and explains why a dictatorship here is pretty unlikely.
For example, where I live it's illegal to have any fireworks that explode. Last night, it sounded like Beirut.
Most people get that stuff from NC, where they are legal. It occured to me that there's nothing more American than driving up I-95 15 miles an hour over the speed limit with a trunkload of illegal firecrackers, MP3s blasting through the stereo.
Americans have a low tolerance for stupid laws, in large part because the country was founded by people who violated such laws.
Picture the fathers of our country dressed up like Indians, trespassing on somebody's boat, and dumping all the cargo just because they didn't wanna pay taxes.
Now, it's hard to say how well this attitude will work to defeat the more stupid provisions of the Patriot Act, which is an interesting name if you think about it; after all, those people weren't patriots, they were just acting, which is a lot like pretending as in "pretenders to the throne". The real kings are the people--the people who break stupid laws.
Now, if the state is really, really determined, they can enforce stupid laws. The war on drugs is a prime example; but they can't do it forever. There has been a huge impact on the incarceration rate, all due to the American tendancy to break laws they don't agree with.
I keep wondering if we're going to have some kind of Bastille Day type episode over that.
At any rate, I think this ingrained attitude in the US, perhaps more than anything, will prevent us from falling into dictatorship. Call me an cockeyed optimist if you must.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?