Congress mulling bill to extend warrantless wiretapping

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) was signed by President Jimmy Carter in 1978 and it laid out the rules by which the government could spy on citizens it thought were involved in acts of espionage against the US government. The original bill dealt with people who were spying on behalf of another government.

Following the 9/11 attacks, President Bush, with the assistance of a bunch of weak-willed Democratic congressmen, signed the USA Patriot Act which expanded FISA's coverage to individuals alleged to be working for terrorist groups not associated with another government.

But enough of the history of the erosion of our right to privacy. Since no one raised a stink then, your expectation of privacy in your conversations has been greatly reduced - almost to the point of being non-existent.

In both the Senate and the House, the Judiciary committees have approved a bill extending the amendments to FISA until 2017. The House committee voted along party lines while the Senate committee approved the bill overwhelmingly. The bill now goes before both houses.

The bill will allow los federales to continue to intercept all telephone conversations, e-mail correspondence and other digital communications between two or more people suspected of being involved in terrorism - even if one of the parties happens to be an American citizen.

How interesting that the Republicans, the so-called champions of limited government, are behind this expansion of governmental power whole-hog. Who the hell needs a warrant to gather all the digital information they can store despite that pesky little Fourth Amendment thingamobob?

Come on, tea baggers, explain how you can go out into the streets yelling and screaming that President Obama is enslaving the American people by requiring them to purchase health insurance, but you are more than happy to let the government intercept our fellow citizens' telephone conversations without so much as a warrant. We mustn't allow the government to regulate industry or pass laws to reduce pollution because that's just so un-American - but it's alright to ignore the plain meaning of the Constitution just because someone with a badge says someone else is up to no good.

Of course that's just details, I'm sure. We certainly can't expect anyone to have an intellectually consistent (not to mention "honest") position when it comes to the leash on government power.

In the meantime, just be secure in your knowledge that, slowly but surely, as sure as the day is long, your reasonable expectation of privacy in anything in anyplace at any time will disappear as if it never existed. You wanted security at the expense of freedom. You've made your bed, now sleep in it.

Looking for the next bogeyman

Yesterday's bogeyman is dead.

Today Scott Greenfield asks whether the death of Osama Bin Laden will change anything. Now that the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks is lying at the bottom of the sea, will the apparatus of the security state be dismantled?

Will the Patriot Act be repealed? Will the government cease efforts to do away with the Great Writ? Will the concentration camp prison at Guantanamo Bay be closed? Will the metal detectors at small town courthouses across the country be dismantled? Will los federales stop trying to force cellphone providers to give the state backdoor access to our communications? Will the airport gropers be forced to look for other employment? Will we finally stop flushing money down the toilet building more and more tools of death for the military? Will our young people be brought home from the Middle East?

I doubt it.

Already the government is warning us that the world might be a more dangerous place because of the death of Osama Bin Laden.

That's what the security state needs -- an enemy. Knock one down and put another in its place. After all, the government must justify the permanence of every "temporary" security measure.

The world is a dangerous place. It was a dangerous place before 9/11. It will be a dangerous place long after I'm dead and gone.

The goal of the security state is to do away with those pesky little protections afforded to us under the Bill of Rights. We can't allow the death of one bogeyman to get in the way of the eradication of our civil liberties. There will always be another threat just around the corner. And, because of that threat, the apparatus of the security state must remain in place. In fact, I'm certain that someone will stand up and call for more draconian security measures in the wake of Osama Bin Laden's death.

Where are those advocates for limited government when you need them?

CRU and the assault on the Constitution

HPD's Crime Reduction Unit (CRU) is making the city safe from the likes of hardened criminals like jaywalkers and bicyclists. It's the cops' version of the lottery -- harass, cuff and search minorities and hope you find a stash of drugs in their pockets, socks or shoes.

Officers in this $5 million unit are targeting those committing Class C violations and using that as their ticket to violate their 4th Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure. The cops figure someone in that neighborhood is up to no good and so they create a pretext for a warrant check and a search - for without probable cause, the case won't stick.

CRU operates much the same as the DWI Task Force -- watch someone long enough and they're bound to give you a reason to stop them. Most of the DWI arrests I've dealt with weren't the result of bad driving -- they were the result of someone getting stopped for failing to signal a lane change, squealing their tires leaving an intersection and speeding. The cops know that going out on DWI duty on a weekend night near an entertainment district is like shooting fish in a barrel -- but they have to create a reason for the stop.

Combine this with courts' narrowing definition of a seizure and it adds up to an erosion of our rights as citizens. Sure, no one wants drunks driving on the streets and no one is in favor of a drug dealer setting up station across the street from them, but when we allow the State to strip the rights of those accused of unpopular crimes, we make it easier for the State to strip our own rights.

For an example look no further than the hysteria following 9/11. In the name of fighting terrorism the American people meekly stepped aside and allowed the federales to tap our phones and our e-mail, to engage in domestic espionage and the limit our freedom to travel. Our government calls al-Qaeda a bunch of savages, yet we say nothing as our government authorizes the torture and humiliation of prisoners -- including our own citizens.