This is an intersting article to see how the Patriot Act has been used over the past 10 years. The fact that it seems to be hardly used for terrorist reasons is surprising. This law has always disturb me how it basically violates large parts of the fourth amendment The lack of needing a court issued warrant for acquiring phone, banking and other records has led the FBI and other federal agencies to issue national security letters asserting that the information they need is relevant to an ongoing terrorism or national security investigation. According to the article less than 1% of letters are related to terrorism. Most appear to be drug related.
The American public needs to wake up and start giving a dam about what this act does and how it invades our privacy. As Sen. Ron Wyden from Oregon states “We’re getting to a gap between what the public thinks the law says and what the American government secretly thinks the law says.“When you’ve got that kind of a gap, you’re going to have a problem on your hands.” This gap is growing people and if no action is taken soon our privacy will be basically gone.
I understand that after the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, there was a need to quickly come up with measures to make America safer. However, the Bush administration's approach and strategy was deeply flawed and they pressured lawmakers to pass the measure quickly. The normal legislative and review process in both chambers of congress never happened. There was no public debate, no agency review and no judicial examination It didn't help that the Justice Department's (mainly AG John Ashcroft) numerous threat after threat warnings forced dissenting congressmen to keep quiet and follow the wishes of the administration so as not to be labeled unpatriotic. As Michael Moore showed in Fahrenheit 9/11 a number of lawmakers didn't even read the act or show even a desire to read it. This is a known problem with a lot of legislation as it is basically incomprehensible to understand unless you have a JD.
Unfortunately I don't see this act being repealed or diminished in its powers any time in the distant future. The average American doesn't care or even understand what this act does and our politicians are so bought off and partisan that they only vote based on what their donors want or how their party leaders tell them to vote.
Are we safer than we were 10 years ago...I guess we are, but is it because of the Patriot Act...I doubt it.
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