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Wake me when the president signs a bill into law that ends the Patriot Act, once and for all. To be honest, we should have standards and secret courts and "nat
by MCRed 11y ago
Wake me when the president signs a bill into law that ends the Patriot Act, once and for all.
To be honest, we should have standards and secret courts and "national security" letters are the very thing that the constitution was designed to stop. (the fourth amendment and the like were meant to put an end to the equivalent of that era.)
Signing or voting for any continuation of the Patriot Act should be considered an unforgivable act by anyone who values freedom.
- tptacek 11y agoThe nondisclosure restriction on NSLs is tied directly to PATRIOT (or at least may have only been tested in the context of PATRIOT), but the concept of an NSL predates it. Really, your issue is with Smith v Maryland.
- drawkbox 11y agoPortions of the Patriot Act are up in June, where will our representatives stand? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/01/section-215-patriot-act-expires-june-congress-ready https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/01/section-215-patriot-ac...
- briandear 11y agoRand Paul has a filibuster planned. http://thehill.com/policy/technology/241635-rand-paul-threatens-patriot-act-filibuster http://thehill.com/policy/technology/241635-rand-paul-threat...
- wanderingstan 11y ago> (the fourth amendment and the like were meant to put an end to the equivalent of that era.) Do you know off hand the name of those era's equivalents? Just some search terms to get me going would be appreciated. I'd like to learn more about the historical precedent.
- nitrogen 11y agoI think the term "general warrant" was used. Hopefully this gets you started, and hopefully others comment with more information.
- joshstrange 11y agoI haven't finished reading it yet but this appears to be a good read with sources https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/att/generalwarrantsmemo.pdf https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/att/generalwarrantsmemo.p... It's linked to from this page which also may help http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/07/nsa-spying-is-exactly-the-kind-of-thing-which-caused-the-revolutionary-war-against-king-george.html http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/07/nsa-spying-is-exactly...
- mpyne 11y agoThe 'general warrants' referred to elsewhere were often used by British customs enforcement who were supposed to use those warrants to search for evidence of smugglers in colonial America. But since they had a general warrant they were easily abused in practice, which in part led to the wording of the Fourth Amendment.
- Balgair 11y agoHow about you wake up yourself, call your congress-critters and express you opinions, instead of falling back asleep. We NEED you to participate in democracy. You, an intelligent internet user that is smart enough to seek out and use a site like HN are far far above the average voter in terms of awareness of internet freedom issues and their implications. Whatever your opinions are, they are likely much more informed than the average US citizen's. Please, please, please, wake yourself up and participate in this great experiment. http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ http://www.senate.gov/ http://www.senate.gov/