From the link: "Wyden wants to add an amendment to curb the use of “secret laws.” Both presidents Obama and Bush keep their interpretations of the Patriot Act secret, and although Wyden has been briefed about the administration’s legal position, he’s not allowed to discuss it in public."

How the Obama administration interprets the law on spying on citizens is a secret that can't be disclosed to the public.

I wonder if they interpret it to include secret detention, secret courts, secret verdicts and secret executions.

Where is WikiLeaks when we need it?

The choice between total secrecy and democracy has always been clear.

Politicians who vote for the patriot act have chosen totalitarian government and do not deserve to be listened to or voted for ever again by people who choose democracy. This act must be eliminated.

Down with the Bloody Corporate Government!

The oligarchy's war against the people of the world began long ago. It had the resources to hire the best planners and actors to ensure the domination of this tiny billionaire elite vs now the world's 7 billion people including 300 million people in the richest country in the world.

One of the first things the oligarchy's experts did was to demonize democratic liberals and make rapacious and undemocratic conservative a great thing to be, effectively letting oligarchy cons off the hook and leaving the libs to blame each other for not being radical and conservative enough.

So that if you are poor and miserable, it is your own fault for not being conservative and caring only about yourself instead of others or not working hard enough in the oligarchy's conservative corporations for less pay and benefits. That is if you're lucky to have a job.

Before we can stop the oligarchy, we need to realize that the enemy is not the long demonized liberals, but the long lionized conservatives.

The Patriot Act tightens the oligarchy's gauntlet as their decadence takes its toll. When oligarchs are able to buy and fund their political candidates, their plutocracy is secure. Their 98% ownership and control of you, me and the rest of the world pie is also.

Direct democracy

The only 'terrorists' we need be concerned with
are those who control our disfunctional government.

"Patriot Act Could Be Worse Than You Thought" and I'm sure it is. So what! "We the People" outnumber the Big Brothers among US many times over. All Big Brother really has is fear. The ability to cow you into compliance.

Ever watch any of the CSI shows on TV? All BS to scare you into conforming or you will certainly be found out! Cities don't have funding or competent staff like on TV. This is the real world. The government uses fear to control US. Martha and Bernie were made examples of and not the norm. Remember the gay guy who won the first Survivor season and then did not report the million dollars to the IRS - same story - made an example to scare the masses of taxpayers into compliance. The real government is a paper tiger. Enforcement is understaffed, underfunded and based on self reporting.

Remember the Bourne movie series and how Jason was always thirty seconds ahead of all these European surveillance systems. All BS. Remember the FBI could not put 9/11 together when warned about Arabs learning to fly plans with no interest in learning how to land the planes.

Think someone is listening in on your phone calls. Get a life! You are one of the millions and millions of nobodies and are more than likely really boring. Any phone monitoring or video surveillance systems are for review after the fact - unless you are John Gotti. We had been monitoring bin Laden's phone for years but, not in real time. Also, we don't have enough translators for foreign speaking suspects - backlog!

All bark and no bite. All hat and no cattle. The point of Homeland Security at airports is to intimidate. Don't be so easily intimidated you wussies. If an old man like Dick Cheney scares you get Depends.

I hope your right, I remember the tanks tearing around in Waco, and all the Military hardware at Ruby Ridge, and think well all it takes is an address. and a creative excuse to send the dogs of war after anyone foolish enough to get out of line! >^^<

Obama says:

"How do you like me now?"

http://therisingriver.tumblr.com/

The ONLY reason for keeping a law or the interpretation of a law secret is to give license to the state to arrest anyone at any time for no reason.

Spying on citizens and visitors.

I went to good ol usa back in 2005 to visit my brother.
From the time i reached customs, where i got taken aside because i filled the wrong form in(was given wrong one in plane)to leaving i was treated like shit from the so called powers that be.
Reach LA after a 20+hr flight and was asked in customs, how long was i there...my reply, 3 months...hers, no your not, 90 days...mine, well might be quicker than i thought. From then on, every flight i went on, was security checked...total of about 10 flights in 2 months...government ringing my brother asking if i was there. I used his place for a base...when found out, i rang them and got told, i wasn't allowed to travel to other states because i gave that address down. Had to go back to Florida or leave, well sorry to say, left within 5 days, i am a Aussie not dark skinned...not another religion, yet got made to feel like a piece of shit.
Never again will i go back. Thats the way a few ppl are treated because they say something to customs. Thats part of the reason why ppl from other countries don't like Americans.

The time has come to end the age of Orwell and return us to the age of concentrating of what's wrong with "us" and how we could have let our nation become so horribly run-down, so callous and uncaring. I see the hoards of homeless people everywhere and the other day my significant other and I gave away all our extra blankets so a few people didn't have to sleep on the unprotected ground. We try to give them some food every now and then but everyone else around us prefers to either ignore them or call the police to tell them to go away. How can we care more about the Patriot Act than millions of homeless Americans?

The patriot act is here to stay and it's directed at the American people. These masturbatory feel up, strip searching 3 year old girls, making 92 year grandma try balancing on her walker while she's taking off her shoes, gives one a glimpse into the purpose of the Patriot Act. Bin Laden is dead but the excuse he gave our political system to turn on it's own citizens is probably going to have an eternal life.