Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

[Kobe]

Big news today about the battle over renewing the Patriot Act and the NYT report about the NSA spying on Americans. The two go hand in hand and it adds up to a very contentious and unfortunately politically charged debate.

Both sides have good points-- in one corner we have the typical rhetoric about national security and the war on terror. In the other we have the standard line about protecting the rights of innocent citizens. If we willingly surrender our own rights to privacy and our freedoms, then what exactly is it that we are fighting for anyway? But then again what good is freedom if you just got blown up....

Has Bush and the NSA gone too far? Should the Patriot Act be made permanent? Is it true that if you've done nothing wrong then you shouldn't mind?

What do you think is the right balance?

[thesightless]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

catch 22, people are screaming that we didnt do enough to stop things like 9/11 and the mcveigh bombings, but the same people are the ones screaming about the patriot act which was instituted to prevent those things at all costs. pick your poison. personally, i'd err on the side of caution. i never wanna have to run up 2nd aveneu for my life again. ACLU wouldnt mind me running for life as long as they can think they have thier way.

[Yao]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

I hear ya Sean...

I wonder how I would feel about that: saw on the news yesterday that the act is not renewed which is in my opinion a good thing: if such an act were to become adopted here, i'd be dissapointed, but that is more because I think that my govt in general is just fucking up things badly you know.

I thinkI've mentioned the release of a potential terrorist with blueprints and stuff here before, and guess what: they did it again...they had ALL THE EVIDENCE THEY NEEDED, but they let him go with the lame excuse that 'terrorist intentions' are not enough to jail someone, even if they have already taped their martyr's message. Dude, I have so little faith in my govt that such an act wouldn't change a bit here: they just need to quit being such pussies here ffs.

I guess in the US after 9/11 there is still a lot of support for the patriot act (though not enough to renew it), but I think you're better off without it. New legislation or reviewing the existing should be able to make up part of it I think, and maybe a new course in foreign politics...?

[neoee]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Let's not forget that the US government had ample opportunity to stop the Sept 11 attacks even without the PATRIOT act. They failed thanks to ossified bureaucracy, not a lack of police powers.

[toasty]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Big news today about the battle over renewing the Patriot Act and the NYT report about the NSA spying on Americans. The two go hand in hand and it adds up to a very contentious and unfortunately politically charged debate.

Both sides have good points-- in one corner we have the typical rhetoric about national security and the war on terror. In the other we have the standard line about protecting the rights of innocent citizens. If we willingly surrender our own rights to privacy and our freedoms, then what exactly is it that we are fighting for anyway? But then again what good is freedom if you just got blown up....

Has Bush and the NSA gone too far? Should the Patriot Act be made permanent? Is it true that if you've done nothing wrong then you shouldn't mind?

What do you think is the right balance?

The Patriot Act is one thing -- I happen to think it gives too much discretion and power to the feds, but it is an act of congress and is therefore the law of the land. It was passed at a time when Congress gave the president carte blanche to do anything he wanted, and I doubt many legislators really thought very hard about it at that time. Now that we have the luxury of time to review its provisions, we ought to use it to decide what provisions should stay and which should go. Surely it does some good, but there are provisions that overreach as well.

Bush's insistence that it must be renewed in full right now is asinine. With it getting ready to expire, why not extend it a couple of months to allow some discussion to be had and some thoughtful decisions made? We do have more than two options, but Bush's black and white, all or nothing worldview would never acknowledge that. The way he paints it, anything other than renewing it in full, right now, is tantamount to allowing the country to go unprotected.

The wiretap thing, though, is on a whole different realm, IMO. First off, there are certainly circumstances where it would be important to listen in on telephone conversations with suspected terrorists, but the warrant requirement would frustrate our ability to do that from a secrecy or time standpoint. That's obvious. What many Bush apologists fail to mention, however, is that there is already a mechanism for doing that -- the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. FISA allows warrantless wiretaps, provided you go within 72 hours to a secret court and demonstrate probable cause. If probable cause can't be demonstrated, the evidence gathered is destroyed.

This seems to be a reasonable balance to me. Why is this not good enough? Why does Bush feel that the government needs the unfettered right to wiretap conversations of US citizens without ever demonstrating that it was necessary to anyone, even a secret court out of the normal public eye?

Under Bush, we have discarded due process in favor of an outcome-based system. For all his talk about freedom and liberty, Bush does not understand what America is all about.

[toasty]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Also, Bush's contention that disclosing his wiretap program helps the terrorists is ridiculous. If you're a terrorist living in the US and you think that you are free to discuss whatever you please because your phone can't be tapped, you're an idiot. There are legal ways to go about tapping a phone line without alerting the target, which makes Bush's decision to try to do an end-around that all the more suspect, IMO.

[daveman]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Let's not forget that the US government had ample opportunity to stop the Sept 11 attacks even without the PATRIOT act. They failed thanks to ossified bureaucracy, not a lack of police powers.

thats a good point. gathering information is one thing. interpreting and using it is another. seems like a waste of money and time to have such policies. most of this was put into effect under ashcroft and that guy is nuts.

it doesn't seem that difficult for authorities to get the appropriate warrants or whatever to conduct searches and monitoring. if they start watching people without warrants it will be abused.

[Yao]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

He seems too eager to keep that law in place, and does not seems to think of actually adapting legislation in order to give the law enforcers more weapons on the long run. The Patriot Act (the name alone is so fucking implying that you must support it to be a good citizen) is an emergeny act...maybe parts of it could be incorporated into normal legislation to make it react better to what is happening nowadays.

[bart_smastard]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Parliament in England keeps throwing out or watering down any anti-terror laws the government proposes . I think the only way to do it is give them total power or don't bother at all ( read about Bush proposing to OK torture though which i think would be a wrong move ) personally id'e allow them to do whatever possible , invest shit loads of cash and make a big push on anyone they think is probably linked to or recruiting terrorists . Then let the country go back to some kind of normality . The ppl recruiting support and future terrorists are only going to prosper whilst little or no action is taken against them . They are getting smarter and more discrete . We need to get tougher to stop it now .

[neoee]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Something Toasty didn't mention about the FISA court that probably should have been is that in the courts history no application for surevillance has ever been denied.

*edit* my comment above is incorrect. They have indeed denied applications. Something at the rate of 1 per year. Sorry

[Kobe]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

Senator Feingold had a great comment the other day, basically saying why does Bush need the Patriot Act if he is just going to wire tap without a court order anyway?

[ZendoBro]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

The right balance is balance itself. The Patriot Act is ridiculous in my opinion. It gave the gov't a blanket a power, which it really didn't need. We can arrest people on conspiracy if we haven't forgotten already. Also the whole NSA thing... Wow! Someone wants their approval ratings to hit rock bottom. In the US there is a system of checks and balances. Apparently that doesn't matter to the president. How does that saying go "You don't need to become a criminal to catch a criminal?"

[superdave]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

I'll go along with giving the government more authority to possibly prevent future terrorist attacks. By that I mean making the Patriot Act permanent and leaving the discretion up to the NSA to decide which communications they should monitor.

In reality, people who aren't committing crimes don't have anything to fear. Also, the NSA has admitted they don't have the resources to listen to everyone's phone calls anyway. They're only going to focus on possible threats. They're only supposed to listen to international calls, but I think they should concentrate on domestic too since its believed there are terror cells already in the U.S.

One of the provisions of the Patriot Act is that government agencies can communicate and share information better. Had this act been in place before 9/11 then possibly the agencies could have shared information better to prevent 9/11. I don't think either side wants to see the Patriot act eliminated, but some honest non-partisan discussion of a permanent act needs to happen.

[ZendoBro]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

In reality, people who aren't committing crimes don't have anything to fear.

That is so trite. We, as Americans, have a reasonable right to privacy. If the gov't felt that you were a threat then they could obtain a warrant legally. This is a case where the end does not justify the means.

[thesightless]

Re: Civil Liberties vs War on Terror - What is the right balance?

sadly, its responses like that, that make me wish the next bad thing happens to people in that camp. not the people who live nromally, but those who fight against the inconvienent steps that really are in place to try to help us. personally, i wish the ACLU was bombed by the ""quote-unquote islamic attack"" it would be even more fitting if it were someone we relased from cuba. they arent raiding random homes and tapping everyone's phone lines as some want us to think. they only spook people who come up as threats and they do it so the person in question cant walk up to a pay phone and call n the next target. just look at the arrests in europe where they find a group of people with building plans and explosives and cash. these arrests are not made off guesses. they are based from wire taps, bank records, and phone records.

its sucks to admit that it might be neccessary and wrong, but it isnt done for no reason. if you value people's privacy so much, do you value the next mohammed atta's right to call up 18 people and plan so much??

god i sound like a right wing nutbag but just think. they arent tappig thephones of the local 18 year kid dealing weed. they are going after the mid 20's to mid 30's middle eastern person who is seen in a mosque with a rather inflamatory leader.