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nice little scam they pulled off
This is the kind of law that sets off alarm bells (not paranoia) about 1984 big brother style government, all the more so because of the gap between how the law was supposedly going to be used and how it is being used, in the war against users of selected drugs instead of against terrorists seeking to kill us.
More good work by Ryan Grim and Senator Feingold.
Patriot Act vs. The People
At a congressional hearing, former AG John Ashcroft was told point-blank that the USA PATRIOT Act was to be used for terrorist detections and prosecutions exclusively, thereby creating a wall of separation between the war on terror and common criminal cases. United States citizens were promised the legal safeguards they had always been entitled to under the Fourth Amendment. The government lied. So what else is new?
Former Drug Czar John P. Walters couldn’t wait to redefine drug users as terrorists after 9/11. When that didn’t work, the prohibs shanghaied the terrorist statutes anyway—surreptitiously, of course. Welcome to Total Information Awareness.
It’s no surprise that drug enforcement in this instance is the primary recipient of the U.S. terror-scare benefit program. Drug enforcement has few if any people voluntarily coming forward to claim they are victims of someone other than themselves for their own personal choices concerning drug use. With no accusers, drug enforcement relies primarily upon informants, coercion, and entrapment. Drug prosecutors make extraordinary threats against informants to get them to testify in drug trials. Many informants are paid to testify.
The right to privacy, a cherished freedom backed by the Fourth Amendment, fought for and won during the Revolutionary War, is the common enemy of the prohibs, subject to attack at every opportunity. Those exercising First Amendment activities that cause prohibs grief also come under attack, as we’ve seen in the Marc Emery case and also the federal attack made against writer Peter McWilliams.
Terrorist attacks can be endured and recovery from their effects is but the work of time. Far more lasting and insidious is an ongoing effort to undermine the Constitution and Bill of Rights under the pretense of good will. Neutralizing terrorists can do little to protect us from our protectors. To do that, the drug war must end.
Giordano
Rights/privilges/patriotism?
They did'nt say "alienable privileges" did they?. They said "INALIENABLE RIGHTS". I am repelled by the sooo-called "Patriot Act" because it implies that one is not 'patriotic' if one is oppossed to the horrid thing. Hey Feingold, why not change it's name and re-right the whole thing? Better yet, why not just let the whole thing elapse?
UPDATE: Feingold Introduces Senate Bill 1686 - JUSTICE Act
Senator Russ Feingold, et al., has introduced a Senate bill (S. 1686) called the JUSTICE Act to amend and reform the surveillance authority of the Patriot Act and the FISA Amendments Act of 2008.
The JUSTICE Act is intended to protect the privacy of records, communications, homes and businesses; to secure First Amendment rights, and to hold corporations accountable for conspiring with the government to break the law.
?!?!
So...Sen. Feinstein feels we need another law to secure our rights granted under the US constitution? As with most laws, the problem is not that we need new ones, what we need is to enforce the ones already in place.
Actually . . .
What is needed is to declare ALL unConstitutional laws null and void, that would get rid of a a whole lot of laws.
I'm pro-choice on EVERYTHING!
It's Feingold, not Feinstein
Feinstein is a rightwing, business subsidizing type Democrat Senator from California, very anti-cannabis and pro-drug war (demagogically so) and disinterested in the idea of limited gov't, or of individual rights except for the people she approves of. A hardcore alcohol supremacist bigot.
What are they going to do if
What are they going to do if you have a dog(s)?
Rather than shoot dogs when they sneak and peak like law enforcement has done many times on normal search warrants,
I wonder if they tranquilize them so you don't know they weren't there. Lol.
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