Protect your Liberty! Stop the Patriot Act!
Stop the Patriot Act!
Bush thugs-in-Congress will be pushing for a vote this week.
This will set up a police state to enslave the American people and will let Bush off the hook for the illegal spying on Americans.
We MUST pressure all of our representatives ASAP!!
Excerpts from the ACLU:
Passage of the reauthorization bill will actually make matters worse for civil liberties in significant ways:
The government will still be able to use National Security Letters and secret court orders under section 215 to obtain a wide array of private, confidential records – including medical, financial, library and bookstore and gun purchase records – with no evidence linking those records to a suspected terrorist or spy.
Those records demands still contain an automatic and potentially permanent gag order, and the right to challenge the gag order is made virtually illusory by the bill’s requirement that a court accept the government’s "national security" certification supporting a gag order as "conclusive."
Secret physical searches of homes and offices will remain available in any federal case under a vague standard, and notice can be delayed for weeks, months or even longer. The Justice Department admits that at least 88% of such searches actually had nothing to do with terrorism.
Roving wiretaps still lack the requirement to name a target or a facility being monitored and without the safeguard that government agents verify that a suspect is actually using the facility before eavesdropping on private conversations.
The bill contains many other provisions, unrelated to the Patriot Act, that harm civil liberties – for example, it expands the Secret Service’s power to impose "exclusion zones" to apply to non-Presidential events, and it increases fines and criminal penalties the Treasury Department has used to coerce non-profits and other businesses into checking employees against flawed government lists.
Nearly 400 communities and the legislatures of seven states have taken a strong stand for meaningful reforms of the Patriot Act, urging Congress to renew the law only if its most significant flaws were addressed. As a result of these calls for reform, many members of Congress on both sides of the aisle came together to lead an effort to better protect civil liberties. In an era marked by partisanship, these bipartisan efforts on behalf of civil liberties were remarkable in their own right, twice forcing delays in approval of a flawed reauthorization bill.
The agreement (by Republicans) reached with the administration accomplishes little of substance...
None of the changes to the final conference report addresses the fundamental flaws of the Patriot Act – the flaws that led to the nationwide movement to correct it.
PFAW says:
"This deal means that the government can continue to legally demand your library and hospital records, even if you did nothing wrong."
Among other major concerns, the compromise version of the bill fails to substantively reform Section 215 which allows federal agents to demand records from libraries, bookstores, hospitals and other businesses after meeting an unacceptably low standard of evidence. According to the text of the legislation, the government can continue to conduct such a search without presenting any evidence that the target is suspected of wrongdoing. People For the American Way has urged Congress to raise the standard in order to protect the privacy of innocent Americans.
"In light of Attorney General Gonzales’ recent testimony on the Bush Administration’s illegal warrantless wiretapping program, the American public has no reason to believe that the government will exercise restraint in its behavior."
Here's the reauthorization act: (very large)
http://judiciary.house.gov/media/pdfs/PAConfRpt120805.pdf
Think the government is truthful about just going after terrorists? Think again:
http://www.bordc.org/threats/spying-protesters.php
You might want to send this link and the next one to your Senators and Congressman. This man is no "girlish liberal". He writes for well-known right-wing publications. Say that to your representatives- Dems and Repugs:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/roberts/roberts142.htm
Tell them you consider them traitors if they do not oppose ALL of the following abusive unAmerican provisions:
- establishment of a federal police force
- provisions that go around rule of law
- provisions that deny habeas corpus
- provisions that go around judicial oversight or the FISA law
- provisions that establish new rules for dissenters
- provisions that increase the power of authority over protesters at ANY event
- provisions that define new penalties
Tell them this administration MUST ABIDE BY THE EXISTING FISA LAW- NOW!!!
ACT NOW: Make as much volume of your voice as possible:
Email, FAX your Senators and Congressmen:
http://www.senate.gov , http://www.house.gov
Then the whole week call them at the Capitol Hill phone:
1-202-224-3121
Then call them again at ALL of their local offices.
http://www.senate.gov , http://www.house.gov
Want to do even more?
Print out the lewrockwell article
http://www.lewrockwell.com/roberts/roberts142.html
On the printout, write "Ask for your representative (Senators and Congressman) at the Capitol Hill phone number 1-202-224-3121 and tell them to protect you from the unAmerican Patriot Act".
Make multiple copies.
Drop them everywhere you go- the laundromat, the movies, the grocery store, the mall, the airport, the bus station.
The public needs to know and needs to act, and the media won't tell them.
Lastly, forward this email to anyone and everyone you know |