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FBI Investigating Lamo Via Patriot Act Provision
umm qasr writes "Mark Rasch, a columnist for SecurityFocus wrote in his Register-reprinted column that the FBI has sent a letter, invoking provisions of the Patriot Act, to journalists reporting on the Adrian Lamo case: 'The letters warn them to expect subpoenas for all documents relating to the hacker, including, apparently, their own notes, e-mails, impressions, interviews with third parties, independent investigations, privileged conversations and communications, off the record statements, and expense and travel reports related to stories about Lamo.' Good to see that our First Amendment rights are being upheld by the FBI."
I really doubt anyone can say right now that USA is the Land of Freedom anymore. How can it be that people don't understand that giving away rights for security doesn't work. You loose rights AND security, with freedom also in the pack.
Creepy vision of the future, the nation that says it will "defend freedom anywhere" is not free, how can it "save" the other nations from not beeing free? Really weird.
Welcome to the hell of American politics - you can vote either Democrat or Republican which makes no noticeable difference.
Bullshit. I'm sick of hearing this lie propagated. The real problem was that the Democrats (and more than a few Republicans) were too spineless to put up a fight in the wake of September 11, and when the Ashcroft submitted the FBI's wish list they just approved it without even reading the fucking thing. Most of them probably thought that if they didn't vote yes, the RNC would be running ads against them next election cycle telling their constituents how they wanted to let the terrorists win. Do a Google search for "Max Cleland Homeland Security" if you don't believe me. Russ Feingold, an ultra-liberal, has risked his political career before and was the target of a concerted GOP takedown attempt back in 1998, but most of his colleagues would prefer to take a stand on other issues that aren't quite so politically volatile. And today's congressional GOP is not known as being a place where dissent is easily tolerated - you don't fuck with Tom DeLay.
Despite what Fox News would have you believe, there is a fair amount of bipartisan opposition to the Patriot Act, and the excresence labelled Patriot Act II was shot down due to protests from the entire political spectrum from the ACLU to hardline religious conservatives. It looks like the sunset provisions (most of them, at least) will not be changed, since there's wide realization that giving the DOJ a blank check may not be a wise course in the long run.
In terms of the Dems vs. GOP choice, these parties are still in power because they continue to reflect the views of most Americans. People generally don't want a heartless, minimalist government like the Libertarians promise us, and very few people are convinced by the Greens' socialist blather.
As an additional historical note, bear in mind that an increasing number of voters have been enfranchised over the past two hundred years, and direct democracy has become quite powerful at the state level, at least judging from my experiences in WA and CA. The sort of things that make it to ballot over here make quite a lot of reasonable people decide that we actually need less democracy, not more.