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Viet Dinh Defends The Patriot Act
Grrr writes "Wired News has posted an interview with Viet Dinh, who worked on the PATRIOT Act for the Justice Department. In the past he said, "Security without liberty - it's not an America I would want to live in." And also, in this interview, "I think right now at this time and this place the greatest threat to American liberty comes from al-Qaida and their sympathizers rather than from the men and women of law enforcement and national security who seek to defend America and her people against that threat." Several of his replies are (predictably / necessarily / discouragingly) less than direct."
The Patriot Act is the worst thing I've seen in 40+ years of living in the USA.
It DESTROYS our privacy rights.
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
The 'experts' who cry that the sky is falling every time the wind blows a leaf to the ground have done a great disservice to the American society and security by magnifying privacy issues beyond reason. The Patriot Act is not perfect, indeed, but the privacy concerns that are always brought up by privacy watchdog groups are usually already handled effectively in the code itself.
If your watchdog barks at every breeze that rustles the trees, you aren't getting any good information from it. Maybe it's time to start looking for a new watchdog or to take security into your own hands.
I have been pwned because my
isn't the objective of terrorism to terrorize people? the more "ACTs" we have the more obvious we're really really scared of terrorists.
now not only people are terrorized by terrorists for physical dangers, they're also terrorized by their own government for privacy invasion.
Planes aren't being hijacked because we stop the dreaded nail clipper from coming on board.
wants to be the first monkey to touch the monolith
"Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Ben Franklin
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It took someone from a communist country to change the US into a totalitarian State.
Everyone was uber-patriotic and wanting to kill any Middle Eastern man who looked at them wrong.
There was actually not much debate in Congress. The Patriot Act passed through very easily. The only problem was that it takes away our checks and balances system of government, which is part of what makes American such a great country.
Don't trust me, though. Read what one website said: "The FBI can now access your most private medical records, your library records, and your student records... and can prevent anyone from telling you it was done.
The Department of Justice is expected to introduce a sequel, dubbed PATRIOT II, that would further erode key freedoms and liberties of every America.
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
How would something that you claim is so horrible get voted into law then?
Same way hitler managed to convince his people that 'jews' were the enemy.
Its called scare tatics.
I highly doubt the DESTROY part where you say we lose our rights. This thing had to be voted for by hundreds of senate/congress men.
Well, you can doubt all you want. Doesn't change the fact that america has made a mistake by following those who have already failed in history. And no, millions, like yourself, were duped into this law by sensless fear.
Untill america gets a clue, things wont improve.
"I do, however, recognize that the act has been mischaracterized and misunderstood and has engendered a lot of well-meaning and genuine fear, even if that fear is unfounded."
Woah he is taking a stand against unfounded fear, isn't that what he is in the business of selling?
He once said that he was drawn to study the government because he "had seen government that did not work," and he was drawn to the Republican Party because of his hatred for communism.
Anybody who would be drawn to a political ideology purely based on what they oppose is, in my opinion, a dangerous person. Especially when mixed with the power, money and support that an organization like the Republican party has.
Do we really expect one of the authors to be impartial and objective?
Disinterested third parties are the analysts we should be interviewing.
While the US has previously imprisoned people without access to council, these were in dire times, World War II, US Civil War, etc. While some could argue that these are equally troubling times, I find the argument problematic.
In both of the above examples, the very existence of the country was at stake, in one of the two, half the US had broken off. The other, millions of people decided to declare war on the US (Germany, Italy, Japan, etc). Despite the tragedy that was 9-11, the entire attack was planned by dozens of people and executed by about 20.
My second problem is the open-endedness. The suspensions of due process in the above cases were understood as temperary and were lifted as soon as the war was over. These days, presidents don't seem to declare war on things that can possibly be ended by a peace treat (drugs, poverty, terror, etc). Tell me, Mr Bush, is the war on terror going to be over before or after the war on drugs?
The suspension of due process indefinitely is an abomination to liberty, which I could've sworn was what we were fighting for in the first place.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
and I'll say it again. Gun laws dont keep guns out of the criminals hands.
How about we get all the illegal aliens out of the country and lock down the borders.
Then, make some less restrictive immigration requirements so people can come over here LEGALLY. (I know of many who wish to, but can't... a problem I attribute to all the illegal immigrants)
Then, and only then, should we be worrying about allowing unconstitutional wire taps, searches, seizures, imprisonment, etc... Those things should only be thought of as a last resort.
And it's not the last resort. It's just what the government wants - not what's best for the people.
Well, in my opinion anyway.
As for the threat of Al-Queida... Well, one simply wonders why Osama Bin-Laden was 'allowed' to escape anyway. US Occupation of Afghanistan should have swallowed the middle-east until we captured him. Instead, we went to Iraq for an easier - more exposed target.
If Osama was cought/dead - we wouldn't even be hearing about this wonderfull work of constitution-warping legislation.
You really don't have a clue, do you? You think the fact that a bunch of little piggies feeding at the corporate trough represent anyone but their own greedy little power hungry selves? You think because after being subjected to a bunch of hot-button advertisements, people actually vote for them, that they somehow represent the best interests of the population?
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."
the old saying "if the only tool you have is a hammer, you will tend to see every problem as a nail". maybe that's why everybody's treated as terrorists now.
Please stop comparing relatively minor problems to the Holocaust. It only desensitizes people to the Holocaust. If you really think what you're going through is anything like Nazi Germany, then you need a SERIOUS reality check, pronto.
This question is a bit slippery because it is difficult to name civil liberites at all. Even the ones that aren't being taken away. It might be a better measure to ask people how they feel about their freedom. Do people think twice about doing certain things that they might not have done before. Do they feel their privacy is being encroached upon. Are they more worried now about what the government can do to them.
Civil liberty is a gut feeling, not a simple enumeration.
Being locked up for no listed crime, with no represnetative, for being of a certain faith and descent, is what i would term a violated civil liberty.
Just look at the history of law enforcement. They begged for the ability to seize the property of drug dealers, and were granted that power by short sighted politicians. Now that power is used to steal cars from people never even charged with a crime - in complete violation of the Constitution, but what's the shredding of that moldy old paper when stopping evil drug dealers?
-- Will program for bandwidth
Come on, folks, of course he's going to defend the PATRIOT ACT - he wrote the damn thing. Of course he's going to defend its enforcement - he helped enforce the damn thing. And of course he's going to be vague about the illegal/unconstitutional parts of the act, or of its enforcement - you think he wants to go to prison?
I support Viet Dinh's use of his 5th Amendment rights in this article.
What I don't support is the many parts of this act, and its enforcement, that are illegal, unconstitutional, immoral, and so far beyond the scope of Federal powers as to shock the imagination. I'm about ready to start looking into how we can find a strong libertarian presidential candidate who has a good chance of being elected. Along with a willing Congress, I'd like nothing more than to see the Federal government stripped down better than an unattended Corvette in south-central LA on a Friday night.
I want to see the Federal government up on cinder blocks, with the states standing around checking out their new goodies. Things are getting out of hand. We're spending more than $400 Billion a year on our military, just so we can stretch it to the breaking point by playing parent to the world. We're spending... well, we don't know how much we're spending on the very intelligence agencies that watch our every move. Why don't we know how much we're spending? Sorry, that's classified. Well, what are you doing with my money? Sorry, that's classified. Why is it classified?! It's my money! Sorry, that's classified. Well what am I getting in return for my unknown investment? Safety. Could you be more specific? Sorry, that's classified.
It's about time for a change. I wonder how much longer it will be before Americans can get together enough courage to dismantle the bulk of the Federal government. Are we ready for 10 - 20 years of readjustment, the end result of which is far more freedom and a return to the Constitutional Republic we once had? Or shall we sit on our collective asses for a bit longer while Uncle Sam's goons start doing random cavity searchs to see what we might be hiding?
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
I bet it'll be modded as flamebait, but it's my oppinion anyway, so I'll post it.
I think right now at this time and this place the greatest threat to American liberty comes from Bush and their sympathizers rather than from Al-Qaida.
This works this way: An unjustifiable attack to other countries (like Iraq) leads to more anger from its citizens and even other countries. Now we have not just one group of loons who hate the US (Al Qaida), but many.
-
Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
The Holocaust was nothing if not a near-infinite series of "relatively minor problems."
Fuck Godwin. I reserve the right to learn from history, even if you don't. If you're not scared half out of your mind, you're not paying attention.
I think that somebody who doesn't understand the distinction between correlation and causation has no business whatsoever rewriting the Constitution.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
But that's how it starts. As a relatively minor problem. Holocaust magnitude tragedies are only the consequence. I quote from my own website "quotes" page:
Hermann Goering
"Why of course the people don't want war. Why should some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? Naturally the common people don't want war neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
(at Nurnberg trials)
I'd be very interested in someone asking Viet Dinh substantive questions about specific concerns raised in the Patriot Act, but I'm unable to draw much of any conclusion from reading this article, especially not the same alarmist conclusion that the story submitter has drawn.
Another interpretation I could make, especially based on the story submitter's comments, is that the critics of the Patriot Act are equally incapable of discussing the ramifications of the Act as are its supporters. Unfortunately, it's the job of the critics to do a good job criticizing and they get far too hung up in rhetoric and name-calling to take most of them very seriously and given that the law is now on the books, I think they're going to need to change their tactics if they want to have any substantive effect.
Oh crap, I seem to be falling prey to the standard media script of analyzing process rather than issues.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin
From the article:
If indeed that is your fear or that is your perception then engage in the democratic process. Back up your argument, back up your belief with facts, marshal evidence in order to convince those who are engaged in the process of governance.
Vinh's attitude is that he is "governing" and that we have to come to him with information to change his mind. He does not view himself as a public servant obviously. It is his job to convince the citizens of the United States (not the "governed of the United States") that he needs the tools he has asked for. It is his job to convince the citizens that hsi approach is correct. We do not need to "convince" those who are currently tasked with governing the country. We need to vote their political masters out and get some people in with better attitudes.
Couldn't these statements be turned into the following?
Now he sounds more like a Palestinian suicide bomber.
I *DO NOT* write this in opposition to Israelis or in support of Palestinians, or vice versa. That is merely the example I chose. Substitute the name of whatever nation and suicide bombers you want.
My point is that this person cites the fact that, as a young child, he saw bad things done to has parents, and the resulting hatred, as major influences in his life. This hardly seems to be the person to make objective assessments then write an act such as PATRIOT. By my reading of the article, he is a fanatic and an extremist, the very disease he claims to be fighting.
I think right now at this time and this place the greatest threat to American liberty comes from al-Qaida and their sympathizers
A threat to American liberty? Sure they're a threat, but how on earth can a small, loosely knit band only really capable of random destruction threaten liberty? They may threaten building, airplanes, and (heaven forbid) a city, but the exact same destruction is wreaked on a larger scale around the world by natural disasters.
You need a large army, militia or police force to threaten liberty.
:wq
Believe it or not, there are some of us who are here by choice, and not birth. And we treasure the amazing liberties that we have here, and not in our countries of birth. What a Vietnamese refugee knows about the hunger to live free of worry from his government and free of worry from the enemies of his government could speak volumes about the U.S., but you're to busy making bad analogies to listen.
According to Viet Dinh toward the end of the article: USA PATRIOT and similar legislation will be necessary as long as we are "fighting terrorism." If you think he is correct, then you probably believe that the Iraq war had everything to do with Terrorism, and you are probably the caliber of person to whom I would like to sell this bridge I own in New York.
These people MUST realize that the "War on Terrorism" is a necessarily perpetual one. Is Viet therefore proposing that we give up our civil liberties indefinitely? Whether he knows it or not, that's what he seems to be proposing.
As long as Americans are willing to believe that politics is over their heads and that they shouldn't worry about what goes on in Washington, the way is wide open for some dynastic madman to install himself in the White House without even being elected, and start waging unprovoked wars in countries most Americans can't recognize on continents most Americans can't name.
As THE most powerful nation on Earth that claims to be, (of/by/for) the people, its citizens have a great responsibility to keep their civil servants accountable. If you ask me, most are allowing themselves to be distracted from that responsibility.
And Communism is Totalitarianism.
I'd say those are more "left" than conservative.
Frankly, this appears to be the entire Democratic Platform for 2004. I have heard nothing but "Hate Bush" from Democratic Party since 2000.
pot.kettle.black.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
This is what you call chickens coming home to roost.
To think fascist policies are the result of our most ignoble war.
Who'da thunk? Who indeed...
Visit the best Liberal Blog: DU
Is to secure liberty.
Yes, this does reduce safty in some areas, but that is the price you pay to avoid the real risk involved in allowing desaparacidos.
On the whole it's a pretty good bargain.
If we do not remove liberties than the people who died on 9/11 (I'm a New Yorker, so that list includes acquaintences and directly affected family members) did so as patriots protecting liberty.
If we use 9/11 as an excuse to remove liberties then they died so that we might all be less free and subvert the constitution.
If I've gotta die I'd rather do so for liberty, not a police state.
KFG
No 'ability' is a liberty. That is the old Socialist argument that says, "Who cares if I'm 'free' to own a Lexus if I can't in practice?" Liberty simply means that you have a right to *attempt* to do something - that doing so is not illegal.
He falls into the same trap as Senator McCarthy, by destroying the very thing he seeks to protect in his zeal. I remember stories of the neighbourhood "stazi" agents in the former East Germany, and thought what a horrible sort of place to live. Of course I would fight to the death to avoid having to live in such a society. Then you read about initiatives such as TIA and the PATRIOT act initiatives, and wonder if we really won the cold war after all....
This danger exists on both the right and left of the political spectrum. Censorship and repression in the name of "political correctness" is the other side of the coin.
In one way at least, Al Queda has won the war on terror - they hate the idea of a free, tolerant, pluralistic society, and they have managed to make ours considerably less so.
My rights don't need management.
And, I think it's super-important to state baldly:
Suspected terrorists are ENTITLED to these civil liberties. I don't care where we found them (Afghan sheep fields or Boston, MA), they are human and are entitled to human rights.
I think too many people think that Constitutional liberties apply only to American citizens. The Constitution enumerates restrictions on the US Government, enjoining it from infringing on liberties that were "endowed by our Creator".
I think Mr. Dinh totally fails to understand this.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
How the parent poster can refer to he Patriot Act as a relatively minor problem is beyond me. But history has shown that you (and Goering) are correct. In a nutshell, what you're talking about is incrementalism.
... I know what can happen.
Few societies willingly accept totalitarianism in one gulp, which means that citizens must be weaned onto it in small steps. Make no mistake: the Patriot Act (and many others like it) is a first step. In spite of the many rationalizations used to justify its continued existence, laws such as that really have no place in civilized society, much less the United States of America. Just don't get too complacent: I'm sure many Germans prior to the rise of the Third Reich felt that it "couldn't happen here" but they were wrong. Hey, I've seen Sliders
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Actually, the threat is mostly from your fellow citizens, who just don't care enough. Many have forgotten that democracy and freedom have risks, and the only way to protect them is to recognize, and ignore, that risk. If I stand a .00005% chance instead of a .00001% chance of getting blown up on a plane- but I and my fellow citizens remain free(ie, i didn't have to take my shoes off, didn't have to hand over "papers") so be it. If you aren't, you are a -coward-, and you can damn well pack your bags and move somewhere else, because America was founded by a bunch of guys who got -really- tired of exactly this kind of crap. What gives -you- the right to take -my- freedom, for -your- illusion of security? Franklin said it best: "They that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Nevermind that the risk is infinitesimal; in one year, +10x more people died on our highways than did in all the planes+buildings involved in the terrorist attacks. Every three days more people die of heart disease than died in the terrorist attacks(700,000 people a year, roughly). Nope, I can't have universal healthcare, but I can have Johhny Ashcroft breathing down my neck.
Planes aren't being hijacked because we stop the dreaded nail clipper from coming on board.
Exactly. Further- if you want proof of just how ineffective these measures are, look at countries where "security" is tightest. Israel, for example, is indisputable proof that no matter what you do, you just can't stop someone determined enough; when they stopped Palestinian men, women started strapping bombs to themselves. Then there's England; no end of security procedures did little to stop the IRA. Those video cameras in London, which practically outnumber people, have yielded no drop in crime; same goes for their thousands of radar-speed cameras; in fact, speeding's gone -up-...
Please help metamoderate.
There was never any proof that more than one attack was ever planned. In fact, one attack was more than sufficient to do the worse thing possible: the begin of the American public to accept having their entire right structures being ripped from them.
een volk dat voor tirannen zwicht
zal meer dan lijf en goed verliezen
dan dooft het licht....
H.M. van Randwijk
When the people give in to tirans
they will loose more than body and spirit
then the light will extinguish...
my translation to english.
::deep breath::
/. and bitch and moan all we like but if we aren't doing anything about it, it's like... uh... pissing in the wind.
/. could be if everyone got out and just voted?
Okay kids, here's the thing. We can all sit on
Can you even fathom what a political power the members of
Don't like what you see? Don't talk, do.
Wan't a coup? Fine. Let's have one in November.
S
bah.
Asking a Vietnam refugee... About civil liberties is like asking Jack Valenti about fair use.
Wrong. Asking a Vietnam refugee about civil liberties is more like asking DVD Jon about fair use. Jack Valenti knows nothing about fair use because he never lost the right; a Vietnamese refugee has losh his civil liberties.
My parents fled from Castro's regime in Cuba (which came to power in when they were teenagers). Consequently, they have a deeper appreciation for liberty than any natural born American I have ever met. Why? Because they had liberty and it was taken. They don't want to get it taken again. I imagine that Vietnamese refugees are similarly inclined.
"A people that values its privileges above it's principles soon loses both" - Dwight D. Eisenhower
That post is ignorant at best, but more likely just racist. Sometimes, people who fled totalitarian countries are the most ardent supporters of American freedoms. I can't read into the heart and mind of Viet Dinh, but your post is contemptible.
I was at a course outside DC and one of the students in the class was originally from South Viet Nam. His dad got the family out on a rickety boat, but didn't get himself out before the Communists put a quick bullet in his head. After learning English in an old Army barracks refuge camp, he got an education and became an American citizen. The guy is quite successful and pure capitalist.
But he was without a car at the class and begged me to take him for a tour of downtown DC at night so he could see out monuments to liberty and freedom. Hey, DC traffic is the pits, but how can you deny someone with his story the opportunity to see the monuments to the dream many in the world never get to realize -- freedom.
I was all for the PA until they used to for something other then terrorism, that is when they raided a strip club in Vegas and shut it down, using the PA for an excuse, how can anyone say that it is a law that has been absused?
Have you read the Project for the New American Century, and other papers published by the ideologues driving your country's policy, or have you only listened to slogans on the "tele-screen"?
Got a map handy? Maybe a globe? A copy of a RISK game board would do.
Look at our Northern border. Damn. Stretches thousands of miles, doesn't it? Did you know that since there are no natural obstacles, like say, a horrific uncrossable chasm, any schmuck with a pair of hiking boots can just walk right in?
Now look South. Yep, that big long blue line is the Rio Grande, one of our natural borders to the South. Guess what? You can wade across the bloody thing. The biggest natural obstacle to entering the US is the Southwestern desert of Arizona and New Mexico.
Why do I think that a bunch of Arab terrorists might be familiar with living in desert conditions?
By the way, the War on Drugs has been trying, with fairly serious military hardware, to "seal the border" for years, which of course is why no one could possibly buy anything illicit in a heartland city like St. Louis.
The US is not Japan, a nation with fairly stiff natural borders. Hell, we're not even Armenia.
Say it with me. We could have an army of sleepless "Squiddies" from "The Matrix" patrolling the North, and an army of Terminators and HKs patrolling the South (Yeah, I know, Reese thinks the HKs are easy to dust) ...
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Just cause you came from a repressive government doesn't make you an authority on the US values of liberty. You certainly may love liberty here in the US, but don't tell me that you're qualified to speak authoritatively on the subject.
Our concept of liberty is a somewhat subtle and contradictary thing. It involves tolerance of low-level civil disobediance, basic distrust of all forms of government and law enforcement, and most of all, the understanding that the only true guarantee to liberty is in the Bill of Rights and it's fair interpretation by the courts.
Congress doesn't give us freedom, Viet Dinh's law doesn't give us freedom. The FBI surely doesn't give us freedom. The only thing that gives Americans freedom is the Bill of Rights. Until you understand that, don't lecture me on freedom and American values.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
Oh brother. It's a joke. Anybody without a strong, direct connection to the Vietnam War really has no grounds to be offended. Half the people here are probably either a) two young to get it or b) too ignorant of history to get it.
If you really are one of those people that's offended, that's fine. But rather than waste everyone else's time, just smile, shut up, and have a coke. You can't live your life running around pointing and shrieking like a schoolgirl all the time.
Great... now I probably offended some psycho feminist chick with the schoolgirl crack. And I probably offended a lesbian with the feminist crack. Oh shit.. now I really done did it...
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
"the greatest threat to American liberty comes from al-Qaida and their sympathizers" - What the heck? When did al-Qaida get the right to toss me in prison without a trial and never tell anybody where I am or why? I mean sure, perhaps they'd like to kill me... but deny me liberty? I think not.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
The Holocaust is not unique nor extrodinary. The same thing would not be impossible, or even that unlikely if a charismatic, young, power-obsessed fanatic tried to take over a public building to protest the degredation of "traditional values" here, even today. Look at the blind following Roy Moore got for dumping some cheap corporate art in a lobby somewhere, and he's ugly, a mediocre speaker at best, and the police never even shot any of his followers or put him in jail.
Look, just fuse together Roy Moore, Che Guevera, Kevin Mitnick, L. Ron Hubbard, the guys from Queer Eye, Martin Sheen, and Fred Phelps, send them back to the Great Depression, and have them run for president on the platform of "Kill the Lawyers, Take Their Money". What do you think's going to happen?
That's the strength of fascism, it's not political, it's social and artistic. It's a near-foolproof method of gaining power in a free society, and it just so happens that it appeals to, and works best for, vapid power-fetishists who often happen to be prone to bouts of genocidal mania once they get to the top. The most stunning thing about the Holocaust is that they managed to pull it off before the whole mangled system collapsed in on itself.
what about liberty without liberty? (that phrase itself sounds like some food product; fruit juice without a single drop of fruit juice.
"Where the department has suspected people of terrorism it will prosecute those persons for other violations of law, rather than wait for a terrorist conspiracy to fully develop and risk the potential that that conspiracy will be missed and thereby sacrificing innocent American lives in the process."
- 04 -Tue-2003/news/22512794.html
I wonder how many lives were saved when the DOJ used police powers implemented under the Patriot Act to go after the owners of a strip club:
http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2003/Nov
Thank God we were saved from those terrorists cleverly disquised as a topless dancers.
______________
-----Lick Bush in 2004, the Supreme Court says it's legal!
is that while the interviewer was attempting to illustrate the fear people may feel about the patriot act, it hardly at all actually specifically cites the offending sections. Except for section 215, the interviewer doesn't specifically say the parts of the patriot act that are damning.
By not mentioning the specifics of the act, and instead talking about how people are afraid of the act, this report manages to, surprise surprise, actually stir up more fear (hence all the posts on slashdot.)
What I would like to see is a specific breakdown. here's what patriot act ACTUALLY SAYS and here's what the constitution says, and show me differences. then I can make an opinion. Here's why X is bad, here's why Y is bad.
Also, shame on you if you posted against the patriot act in this thread and have not actually read it yourself. you shouldn't trust the trolls around you to summarize it with their slant.
I for one thought Viet's response to the one accusation, section 215, was actually reasonable. The powers he mentioned exist and have existed on state level and make sense nationally.
and finally, to those who say that our greatest threat comes from our own government: Physical violence against citizens in the most blatant way, murder, is preventable. Each one of those twenty hijackers made a conscious effort. America did not deserve it. not one person who died deserved it. And it could have been prevented had a decent enough intelligence effort been put forth. If the government did NOT put forth efforts to protect us, it would be abdicating its duty.
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
The real problem with the "War on Terror" is... there is no end. When all the Muslims are dead, something else will be classified as terrorism. Unions, "file-sharers", hackers, cable television thieves...
The government of the United States should be concerned with INCREASING my liberty and privacy; not the opposite. If they want to pass a law regarding oversight of law enforcement activities... why don't they pass one INCREASING oversight?
Only one thing will save us and the world from our out-of-contol political system and wannabe emperors... eventually, we will be so far in debt that tyranny will bankrupt itself.
Bush is the most transparently corrupt and immoral president in modern United States history. He does not value our democratic traditions. The only thing more putrefied than Bush and his administration; is the heart of every citizen in the United States who voted for him. We get what we deserve.
Yes, I have read similar publications from them. A typical propoganda piece, full of historical distortions.
Bin Laden is a Saudi, not a Palestinian. None of the Sept 11th hijackers were. Very few Al Queda memebers are. The Palestinian Authority has gone to great lengths to distance themselves from, and denounce Al Queda. They use the existance of the state of Israel is a straw dog. I was able to speak with somebody before in the Egyptian government about the Yom Kippur war. It was quite revealing - the allies never trusted each other, and he admitted that even had the state of Israel been utterly destroyed, there would be no peace or stability in the region. Quite the reverse in fact.
American has lent much material aid to Israel, no doubt about it. They have also lent considerable aid to Islamic countries as well. Turkey enjoys very good relations with the US. They conveniently forget how the NATO, particularly the US and GB went to war to save Muslims in Bosnia.
Al Queda loves to beat their chest about the evils of the 800 year old crusades, (true enough) yet forget about the enslavement and mandatory conscription of Christan children to serve the Ottoman empire.
But you do have one point. Some of the things I see coming from the religious far right in the USA bear an uncomfortable resemblance to statements that might have come from the Taliban.
Although it is not mentioned in your statement, they DO hate a free society. Look at the model society they built in Afghanistan. It wasn't enough even to be a practicing Muslim, look what they did to the Sheite minorities, they considered heretic. You were forced to exactly follow the edicts of their particular (warped) interpretation of Islam.
Not to pick on Muslims by the way, there seems to be an equal distribution of intolerance distributed among all faiths.
My rights don't need management.
That post is ignorant at best, but more likely just racist.
Offensive, possibly. But racist, no. Racist would be that joke applied to a someone of Korean descent, as Koreans have little to do with the Viet Cong but happen to be ethnically related (very broadly) to Vietnamese. Would it be racist to make a "Heil Hitler" joke about a German? And if so, how about a Swede? I realize it's a lost cause, but I just wish the word "racism" were used more accurately rather than as a blanket term for "based on stereotypes".
And to characterize the joke as "ignorant" is also an absurd misuse of the term. I can't imagine that anyone who knows the signifance of the term "Charlie" in relation to Vietnam (and thus understands the joke) would confuse a 35-year-old first-generation immigrant Vietnamese American with a communist guerilla.
It was a silly, offensive joke based on cultural stereotypes. Just leave it at that. And just for the record, I'm a bit of an aficionado of Vietnamese culture, I'm part Asian, and I thought it was funny. (Though I would never repeat it in front of a Vietnamese person.)
Sometimes, people who fled totalitarian countries are the most ardent supporters of American freedoms. I can't read into the heart and mind of Viet Dinh, but your post is contemptible.
Unfortunately, such people aren't immune to engaging in the same mindset they sought to flee: Little Saigon, 1999 And the Cuban refuguee community in Florida isn't much better behaved, in my opinion.
I think right now at this time and this place the greatest threat to American liberty comes from al-Qaida and their sympathizers
Actually according to a pentagon report the greatest threat is from a changing environment and it's consequences on global societies.
The terrorist threat is arguable greater today then it was 3 years ago. Fighting "terrorist" militarily is like squeezing a pimple it only makes it worse and takes longer to heal. Terrorism is best countered by emphasizing ideas (such as liberty , equality, education) and centering a foriegn policy more on these ideals then self-interest.
I read somewhere that as population increases in density, individual rights suffer to maintain order. I think the PA, along with other various trends in loss of personal freedoms and individual liberties and increasing world turmoil may be at least partly a function of the increases in world population densities. Up till relatively recently in history, there has always been unexplored/unsettled lands for citizens who had "had enough" of their gov/empire/whatever to go to, and be free of _any_ power but their own. In the past, citizens could just vote with their feet. Not these days. I just hope that the civilization here can last long enough without imploding until space travel becomes viable as a way to escape
overbearing/overwhelming gov control. Seems to be a very slim hope, at the moment.
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Your definition of "race" must be different from mine. I don't consider German or American or German-American or Swedish or Vietnamese to be races. Racism would be making a Viet Cong joke about someone solely because he has black hair, thin eyes, a flat nose, and whatever physical attributes associated with people from East Asia. The connection between a Vietnamese and communist guerillas, or between a German and Hitler is historical, not ethnic. That's the point I'm trying to make. And the reason I'm doing so is that "racism" has become the politically-correct catch-all blanket condemnatory term for any sort of discrimination, and used inaccurately.
Yes, it would be both ignorant and racist to make a Hitler joke about a Swede. The Swedes have been non-aligned for a long time.
It would be ignorant certainly, because a Swede has no unique connection, ethnically or historically, with Hitler. For it to be racist, the teller would have to draw a link from blond hair and blue eyes, to Germany, to Hitler. That's beyond ignorant, it's simply stupid. And Sweden's policitical history is totally irrelevant to anything at ll.
I stated clearly in my previous post that the joke can indeed be characterized as offensive, in its use of stereotypes about Vietnamese. That's why I wouldn't tell it to a Vietnamese. As for "hatefulness", that's another glib assertion. I thought the joke was funny, yet I know I am not hateful towards Vietnamese.
Moreover, the muslims in Bosnia are of Turkish descent. Arabs and Turks have never got along well. Turkey also has economic and military ties with Israel. So I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Arabs don't really care what happens with Turks...
I'd say the Bill of Rights would count as "essential liberties", wouldn't you?
quote still works for me.
Here's a better idea: If you present your grievances in a civilized manner, we will address them. If you engage in terrorism, we will not only make sure you don't get what you want, but also take away what you already have along those lines (e.g. the Taliban regime).
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.