Looking ahead

[khaosworks]

April 9, 2003
Republicans Want Terror Law Made Permanent
By ERIC LICHTBLAU

WASHINGTON, April 8 - Working with the Bush administration, Congressional Republicans are maneuvering to make permanent the sweeping antiterrorism powers granted to federal law enforcement agents after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, officials said today.

The move is likely to touch off strong objections from many Democrats and even some Republicans in Congress who believe that the Patriot Act, as the legislation that grew out of the attacks is known, has already given the government too much power to spy on Americans.

The landmark legislation expanded the government's power to use eavesdropping, surveillance, access to financial and computer records and other tools to track terrorist suspects.

When it passed in October 2001, moderates and civil libertarians in Congress agreed to support it only by making many critical provisions temporary. Those provisions will expire, or "sunset," at the end of 2005 unless Congress re-authorizes them.

But Republicans in the Senate in recent days have discussed a proposal, written by Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, that would repeal the sunset provisions and make the law's new powers permanent, officials said. Republicans may seek to move on the proposal this week by trying to attaching it to another antiterrorism bill that would make it easier for the government to use secret surveillance warrants against "lone wolf" terrorism suspects.

Many Democrats have grown increasingly frustrated by what they see as a lack of information from the Justice Department on how its agents are using their newfound powers, and they say they need more time to determine whether agents are abusing those powers.

The Senate Democratic leader, Tom Daschle of South Dakota, said today that without extensive review, he "would be very strongly opposed to any repeal" of the 2005 time limit. He predicted that Republicans lacked the votes to repeal the limits.

Indeed, Congressional officials and political observers said the debate might force lawmakers to take stock of how far they were willing to sacrifice civil liberties in the name of fighting terrorism.

Mark your calendars, boys and girls, and let's make sure the Act dies a natural, unmourned death when the time rolls around. Hopefully by that time there'll be a sane administration in power. But then again - and here's my conspiracy theorist hat going on - maybe we'd better watch out for another terrorist act around the time of 2005 when the vote rolls around...

Comments

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

I don't even know what to say anymore.

A.

[gingicat]

Yeah, I heard about this at the talk last night at Simmons. The ACLU is working on this

Another problem, of course, is that lots of stuff in USAPATRIOT is already permanent. Plus, FISA and NAFTA, passed much earlier, already allow for secret courts. Lovely, isn't it?

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

You really, really ought to read "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" by Greg Palast. Suddenly a whole lot of things make a lot more sense to me.

[estoile.livejournal.com]

But then again - and here's my conspiracy theorist hat going on - maybe we'd better watch out for another terrorist act around the time of 2005 when the vote rolls around...

With serious questions being raised about the honesty and reliability of the new closed-source electronic voting systems (which in most cases are conveniently paper-trail-free), ShrubCo may not need any extraordinary measures to produce a Republican landslide.

http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,56370,00.html
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2003/02/20/voting_machines/index.html

Paranoid? Nope. Just aware of how very simple it would be to rig an election with these things. There's no proof that it has happened, but that's just the point: no proof. Of anything. Ever.

I think I need chocolate. (Or maybe I could try to find a new comfort food that doesn't involve slavery. ::sigh::)

But it was a very pretty day today, and the fall colours are coming out nicely. And my son had great fun chasing seagulls and throwing horse chestnuts into the river. Lalala...

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

And the person behind all this? iVotronic, which is supplying Florida with the vote-counting machines, is represented in that state by one Sandy Mortham, who is the found of "Women For Jeb", and Katherine Harris' predecessor as Florida Secretary. The iVotronic machines have already been used once - in Jeb Bush's reelection bid for governor during the midterms, which he won.

And there's plans in the works to spread the same kind of voting purge methods used in Florida in 2000 and electronic voting machines throughout the rest of the states. The fix may already be in for 2004.

Want to move to Canada?

[estoile.livejournal.com]

Want to move to Canada?

Nope. Too close. I am immensely, insanely grateful to be living in New Zealand, with a government that usually knows when to tell the US to sod off. Even if the PM does find it necessary to grovel a bit occasionally.

Some of my relatives are making plans for the Canadian exodus, though. I just wish I could get them all out. Or better yet, get ShrubCo out. Find them a nice little place in the Nullabor, perhaps ... Or somewhere in the middle of Patagonia.