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PATRIOT Act Extension Scheme Sells out Constitution
U.S. House and Senate leaders have reached a bipartisan backroom deal to push for approval of a four-year extension of the the most controversial components of the USA PATRIOT Act, in a move that rejects calls for responsible reform of the law by civil libertarians on the right and the left.
With prodding from the Obama White House – which has been working for months to secure a long-term extension of the PATRIOT Act -- and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, there will be a full-court press in coming days to win congressional approval for the extension of PATRIOT Act provisions that are set to expire May 27. But there will be opposition from both sides of the aisle to this bad bipartisanship, The toughest test will come in the House, where a coalition of Tea Party conservatives and united Democratic caucus could upset the rush to approve the extension.
It will be tough to block a lobbying push by key congressional leaders, especially in the Senate, where Reid and McConnell are co-sponsoring the extension proposal. But there is no question that there will significant be opposition to this assault on basic constitutional values.
As Shahid Buttar, executive director of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, says: "This agreement reeks of all the worst things about Washington: secrecy, back-room dealing, institutional co-optation, and bipartisan collusion to undermine constitutional rights. The death of Osama bin Laden offered the hope that our nation's leaders might finally restore sanity to the national security establishment in the wake of mounting documented abuses. Instead, they insulated it from debate and rammed the PATRIOT Act down the throats of hundreds of millions of law-abiding Americans. I am, quite frankly, disgusted."
Among the PATRIOT Act provisions that congressional leaders hope to extend without any changes, until June 1, 2015, are sections that (in the words of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee) outline:
1.) The government’s power under PATRIOT Section 215 to obtain secret court orders for "any tangible thing"—including Internet, phone, and business records—that the government believes is relevant to a terrorism investigation.
2.) The government’s power to use non-specific "roving" wiretaps to monitor any phone number, email account, or other communications facility that the government believes is being used by its target.
3.) The "lone wolf" wiretapping power, which allows the government it to monitor individuals who have no connection to any foreign power or terrorist group.
The leadership deal was decried by the a broad cross-section of civil libertarians, with the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, warning that "the PATRIOT Act is being set up—yet again—to force profound abuses on the American people without any meaningful debate."
The worst part of the deal making on the part of the House and Senate leaders -- with prodding from the Obama White House -- is that it extends abusive components of the PATRIOT ACT that were in the process of being reformed.
The Senate Judiciary Committee has approved legislation sponsored by the committee chair, Senator Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, that would require greater auditing and public reporting of surveillance initiatives.
Now, even those modest attempts to impose a measure of accountability appear to have been abandoned.
“It’s shocking that even some of those requirements are now down the drain for another four years," explained Michelle Richardson, a legislative counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union.
If the Congress approves the deal being pushed by the congressional leaders, Richardson said, work by civil libertarians, constitutional scholars and citizens across the United States to address the worst abuses associated with the PATRIOT Act -- and, ultimately, to guard against those abuses -- will end with “no reform and no long-lasting institutional oversight.”
Republican leaders in the House are preparing to "whip" members to back the agreement.
But individual Republican members are objecting as this week's debate approaches.
"Americans have an expectation of privacy," says Congressman. Rob Woodall, R-Georgia, who in February voted against a temporary extension of the Patriot Act.
"The provisions up for renewal in the Patriot Act may have legitimate uses in combating terrorism; however, we have a higher duty to uphold the constitutional protections all Americans are guaranteed," says Woodall. "I will certainly keep this duty in mind as I consider the upcoming extension, and I hope that my colleagues will as well."
That's the right response. The question is whether more members of both parties will take their oaths to defend the Constitution more seriously than the pressure from John Boehner, Mitch McConnell and Harry Reid.
23 Comments so far
Show AllIs John Nichols finally buying a ticket for the train to Clueville?
We'll see. I'm skeptical.
Islamoterrorists, the Easter bunny and Santa Claus.
None of these exist.
All are creations to make craven capitalists in industries from defense and oil to chocolate and toys richer.
If you want to spend my tax money to protect me to the fullest tap every phone and email account at Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Northrop Grumman.
If any employee at these criminal organizations even thinks about selling a credit default swap or drone airplane I want a dozen large swat team members to jump on him and taser him until there's smoke coming from his ears.
That's how a real Patriot would Act.
" The death of Osama bin Laden offered the hope that our nation's leaders might finally restore sanity to the national security establishment in the wake of mounting documented abuses."
Hardly. If anything it was a ploy to further the ever growing expansion of this highly profitable industry. Our nation's leaders are highly vested in its financial success.
True enough. Once we'd assassinated OBL, the media was screaming out that this will certainly create more terrorism, as OBL's followers will seek revenge. At least for once they admitted that our actions in the Mideast encourage terrorism. But if people were too stupid to figure that out, they're too stupid to see the ploy here.
I've just emailed my 'gutless' Representative in the House to 'encourage' her to vote Nay on the extension of this most egregious piece of crap legislation.
Just like the 'miraculous coincidence' of the New Pearl Harbor (9/11) which happened after Cheney & the Bushistas took power, the "Patriot" Act - all 800+ pages of it, miraculously materialized almost immediately after the dust settled in NYC.
But, but Osama is dead ???!
Again I ask, what "deal"?
What did Reid trade away in exchange for McConnell's support? What did McConnell surrender to get Reid in his corner? What did Boner "deal" away?
With apologies to Inigo Montoya, "You keep using that word 'deal'. I do not think it means what you think it means."
As 'Deep Throat' so eloquently put it:
"Follow the Money"
If Obama didn't want this, it wouldn't be happening. Obama and most of his fellow Democrats are part of the problem. For the solution, we must look elsewhere. What's wrong with right wing Republicans and liberal Democrats coming together to defend the Constitution?
Both Republicans and Democrats are acting like Corporate Fascists.
I think you should replace the word acting with the word are. It is here. Great comment down thread about facism.
Sioux Rose, in addition to the weapons you mentioned, Obama has the power to shut down the internet too.
Karma deems to have come to the South by the way of Nature. Let us see how many who want government out of their lives or a smaller one turn to it for help.
If things like this doesn't get this country off its butt, I don't know what will.
If we take into consideration the likely fact that elite planners are well-aware of the long-term impact (and cost) of climate change events, added to the inevitable discontent of a society where 10% (or more) of its citizens can find no meaningful work, added to the sinister fact that costs of basic necessities are going up... we see the prescription for massive civil unrest.
The Patriot Act is the pretext for subduing this discontent largely by monitoring it through an agency of The (various) Watchers. Their presence is in this forum, and elsewhere.
Were a real counter-movement to form, the defenders of the establishment/status quo have their artillery already in place. What passes for law is like an express train off its intended rails. For tracks have been laid to subtly couple principled dissent with, of all ungodly false charges, terrorism. The rules of law have broken down without guarantees of right to a fair (NOT! military) trial, Habeas Corpus, or use of evidence the government would likely hide under the banner of "State Secrets."
Ironically, it's only through the collapse of existing systems (an increasingly more inevitable outcome) that real change will have room to ensue.
I'm sure I'm not alone in hoping for that day when all this massive surveillance is turned on the ones who instituted it. Then again, all the soapy detergent in the world would be insufficient to counter THEIR dirty laundry.
If you haven't viewed the film, "Good Night, and Good Luck," you should. It's like deja vu watching this latest McCarthy Phase take hold of our nation. Sick, really, but not without precedent when the authoritarians gain control of all the would-be checks and balances. Implosion Happens!
You are quite correct. The need was seen for a "Patriot Act" years ago by those in power. They knew full well that the "American way of Life" unsustainable and would eventually lead to economic collapse and chaos.
The power of Government to act on BEHALF of the Corporations and the elite so as to ensure that power structure remained required a "Patriot Act".
Socialists and those who would demand a restructuring of power and the dismantling of the Corporate state WILL be deemed terrorists and will and are being monitored.
Thanks, GW, these are dangerous times for those of us who study (and reveal the language of) prophecy.
JOE Cool: Don't forget one thing: many in the South have been fed the fiction that God wants the End to this world. Therefore they see evidence of this seeming reality in the form of all the dangerous weather events. In other words, a compelling (for some) spiritual narrative has been offered which effectively pre-empts the wiser need for lfiestyle changes. And guess who this deceit favors most? All those who profit from the current make-war/make-pollution establishment, most notably, bankers & the MIC, with their richly rewarded political enablers on hand... till the big winds blow THEIR way.
There is agreement between the two corrupt parties that the United States must be a totalitarian state in order to be engaged in a state of permanent war that its population might begin to oppose at some future date.
"The death of Osama bin Laden offered the hope that our nation's leaders might finally restore sanity to the national security establishment in the wake of mounting documented abuses."
-- Shahid Buttar, executive director of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee
________________________
I don't mean to go all Chris Hedges on Buttar's ass, but I find this wistful positing of a silver lining to the Bin Laden Caper characteristic of well-meaning but delusional, short-sighted liberal-lite thinking.
Whether it's the Amerikan Imperium's domestic authoritarian Hollow State or the military and intelligence "kinetic actions" of the Permanent Global War on an Abstract Noun, moderate progressive, liberal spokespersons and pundits have rushed to declare, "Aha! Now that bin Laden has been eliminated, surely the Amerikan government can begin to pull in its claws and reverse the domestic and foreign security-state aggressiveness that sharply escalated after 9/11/01!"
It's certainly a "reasonable" argument or expectation. But it's predicated on a shallow, foolishly or naïvely optimistic view of Amerika's ruling class and government. Once an authoritarian Hollow State reaches escape velocity, and acquires momentum and intertia, it is not about to view events like the dubious and problematic death of an iconic "enemy", a Goldstein, as an "opportunity" to apply the brakes and risk orbital decay.
They like it up there.
The draconian "Patriot Act" is here to stay because the duopoly is overwhelmingly attached to it. At most, enough "principled" Congressional critics will prevail and effectuate "reforms"-- tweaks, refinements, supposed improved oversight and safeguards, the whole megillah.
You know, like the way they passed a new, improved FISA act that actually strengthened the anti-Constitutional, anti-civil liberties premises at its core. Nothing makes career politicians happier than fixing bad legislation with hard-fought incremental reforms; with luck, and a dim light, they come off as fighting the good fight-- appeasing and encouraging "pragmatic" moderates and centrists given over to the soft bigotry of low expectations.
It's nice that writers like Nichols still mount hortatory challenges to Elected Misrepresentatives, urging them to follow principles and conscience rather than the sordid power-brokering of party leaders and time-servers. But he may as well be blowing on a dog whistle.
O.S. As always, aptly and intelligently stated.
For those who like historical parallels, Hitler was finally elected and began to consolidate his power. The German people had thought him a clown as he slowly rose to power. After all, the law would hold him in check, wouldn't it? Their Supreme Court would not let anything illegal be perpetrated, would they? Shortly after Hitler took power, the judges were replaced by Nazis. After that, justice was what the Fuehrer said it was, nothing more. The body of law, centuries old, was expunged or altered to Nazi policy.
Right after Hitler became Reichchancellor the SS burned down the Reichstag building and blamed it on a Dutch communist who also happened to be mentally challenged.
Immediately, the Enabling Acts were put in place to "protect" the people from the "communists." The Enabling Acts removed the constitutional protections of the German People and put it all in the hands of the Nazis. Read them sometime. They remind one of the misnamed and unconstitutional "Patriot Act," which was to do the same thing to the American People. The Nazi government had the right to read all correspondence, listen to all phone calls, search any house at any time, and anybody protesting was hauled to the camps, or shot in the street while "trying to escape."
After that, it became a criminal offense to criticize Nazi policy. The unions, the clergy, newspapers, then the middle class, all went down the tubes, or into the camps. Krystallnacht, followed, and not long after, "the Final Solution."
The Enabling Acts were "temporary measures," to protect the people for the duration of the emergency. The emergency became permanent, with the Nazis taking the small countries around it, for defense and protection of the Reich. When Poland was attacked, the world had had enough and World War-II commenced.
Now, we have had our "Reichstag fire" and our "Enabling Acts" were enacted. We have gone from one emergency to another, expanding our wars as our infrastructure crumbles. Soon we may find ourselves working at what we are told to do, for whatever pay we may be given, with resistance met by being sent to the camps, or by being shot in the streets.
Dr Lawrence Britt did a study of fascism and wrote the report below. Does anything seem familiar? If it walks like a duck...
Fourteen Defining
Characteristics Of Fascism
By Dr. Lawrence Britt
Source Free Inquiry.co
5-28-3
Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining characteristics common to each:
1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.
6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
8. Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.
9. Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10. Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.
12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
14. Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
MINITRUE: Most-excellent post (and information). I said some time ago (as did others in this forum) that the events extending from the 911 attack (inside job) read straight from the Nazi playbook. The fact that so few hold a knowledge of history, no less what happened 3 weeks ago, favors the dark powers. They need not fear that history's lessons (or memory, thereof) will impede them...
Let's see how long this post remains up. I will cut & paste it NOW for my records. Thank you for laying it out with erudition.
The evidence for the statement that "the SS set the Reichstag fire" in 1933 is mixed at best. More likely, according to most scholars, is that van der Lubbe was guilty, and Hitler seized upon the symbolic disaster to win support among most Germans for the Enabling Act that would lay the basis for his dictatorship.
Hitler did not replace all the judges. Most were quite willing to continue in office, and revise their practices in accordance with the "New Germany". To say otherwise is to minimize one of the most tragic and disturbing aspects of Nazi tyranny: the widespread and continuing support it received from the German people.
Dr. Britt does not mention several defining aspects of fascism: submission to a charismatic Leader who is promoted, and received, as a Man with almost supernatural qualities that allow him to supersede the normal forms of government. I don't think Suharto makes the grade on this. He was a mere ruthless dictator, not a kind of god to the people of Indonesia. Peron was that kind of Leader, Pinochet was just a ruthless dictator.
The Leader principle (Fuhrerprinzip) leads to another aspect of fascism that Britt does not mention: the emphasis on mass involvement in the regime, through the single political party, youth organizations like the Balilla in Italy or the Hitler Youth, and a constant state of mass mobilization alien to most "normal" dictatorships.
The Leader principle and the effort to keep the masses mobilized are the hallmarks of fascism. Non fascist dictatorships are also prone to crush dissent, smash unions, invade privacy and ignore human rights, align themselves with religion (fascism does not necessarily align itself with religion; it organizes workers into "national minded" unions; it wavers between inciting violence and enforcing order; its militarism is common to many regimes; sexism is found everywhere; many regimes are partners with the business sector), etc. But without an idolized Leader and constant efforts to incite active mass support, there is no fascism, only dictatorship.
The Patriot Act certainly compromises human rights. The Supreme Court says it is constitutional, which in practice resolves the debate over its legality. But it hardly brings in any kind of fascist regime. For that to happen, a Leader -- not a mere president or politician -- would have to arise. So far, there is no one to fill that key role. And that Leader would have to be the focus and embodiment of mass involvement in political activism. Some people fear Obama has the kind of charisma that a fascist Leader has. The facts show otherwise. Obama is a very able, but not untypical American politician, content to work within the system as it exists. He does not pretend, nor do his supporters pretend, he is anything like the embodiment of the nation, raised up by Providence to guide it and destroy its enemies.
The Tea Party might be considered a kind of fascist form of mass mobilization. But it lacks the leader-orientation, the violence, and the top-down organization characteristic of fascist movements.
Rather than strain to identify things like the Patriot Act as fascistic, it would be better, I think, to focus on its real defects, not in the kind of legalistic way that too many Americans prefer (is it consititutional?) but by evaluating it in comparison with the right of every human to privacy, etc. On that score it fails, and should be opposed -- not as the prefiguration of a fascist regime.
LEEZASKY: Thank you for the intelligent post. Perhaps you're aware of Sheldon Wollin and his concept of "Inverted Totalitarianism?" Nature tends to repeat patterns by adding on new forms of adaptation. I would venture to say that fascism is doing likewise. Must it center itself around ONE charismatic leader? Suppose the central rallying point acts as unifying concept instead?
EZEFLYER has on several occasions posted the 14 signatures of fascism, and most can be readily identified with in our land today.
If we miss the forest for the trees, our flawed perception will not innoculate us against the dis-ease at hand.
Oops! I just realized that Mini-true listed those...
Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining characteristics common to each:
Please note that Dr. Britt listed 14 defining characteristics COMMON to each regime. This was not an exhaustive examination of fascism in its many forms, just identification of certain commonalities found therein. (and herein)
Patriot Act sells out Constitution...
well, yes, but we've only gone so far...
let's go all the way...
Constitution sells out citizens...