ACLU: House Judiciary Committee to Consider Patriot Expansion Legislation;

[Selwynn]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: [e-mail]

WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today strongly urged the House Judiciary Committee to reject a proposed expansion of the controversial 2001 counter-terrorism law, known as the USA Patriot Act. This new bill could be voted on as early as Wednesday.

"Just as the Patriot Act was passed with limited debate, the Judiciary Committee has yet to hold any public hearings on this expansion," said Laura W. Murphy, Director of the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office. "Congress must move slowly before considering any further expansion of government powers. It should fully evaluate the original Patriot Act’s effects on public safety and civil liberties before further reducing judicial review of government wiretapping and taking other steps that reduce government accountability."

The new bill, called the "Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Tools Improvement Act of 2003" (H.R. 3179), includes many provisions of draft legislation leaked from the Justice Department last year. That bill was roundly criticized by both Republicans and Democrats and never moved beyond a draft.

This new proposal would increase the government’s powers to secretly obtain personal records without judicial review, limit judicial discretion over the use of secret evidence in criminal cases, eliminate important foreign intelligence wiretapping safeguards and allow the use of secret intelligence wiretaps in civil cases without notice or an opportunity to suppress illegally acquired evidence.

More:
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=15589&c=206

[acmavm]

1. Just as we are disgusted by what is happening in Iraq, we MUST show

our contempt and disgust by what the government is trying to pull with the expansion of the 'Patriot Act'. The is nothing patriotic about the futher erosion of our right to privacy from government intrusion. Soon, if this pasts, we will be living in a country worse than the old Soviet Union because of the technological advances in the last decade. Everything you do, every place you go, everything you buy, everything you post on the internet, will be monitored by the government.

Please, stop for one second and get ahold of you representatives.

I did my internship with the ACLU for my paralegal degree. I know some of what is going on now, the horrible things that are being done to normal people by authorities who try to force their actions down our throats under the guise of 'the benefit of the people'. Stop and think for a second of the impact of this act on our lives, and if not for yourself, for future generations.

[Selwynn]

2. Of all that has happened in the last four years, PATRIOT ACT is the worst

Of all the things that has happened in the last four years, the PATRIOT act is the most terrifying and dangerous to our democracy I fear. Honestly, the situation in Iraq is horrible too, but to be frank, there is so much focused attention solely on the war in Iraq that other issues even more permanently devastating long term to our democracy go unchallenged and unnoticed by many.

The fact that there were massive demonstrations about the war in Iraq and few exclusively about the rape of the constitution via the PATRIOT act is terrifying to me. These new measures place the United State FULLY in the realm of being a fascist, totalitarian state. And its like most people I know haven't even read the PATRIOT act and don't even know about things like this, but they can chant "no war for oil" with the best of them...

I agree that the war in Iraq was both started for morally wrong reasons, based on lies and deceit and is not a disaster from which we must withdraw, however there is nothing more brutally seriously threatening to our long term chance of maintaining democracy than these continuous destructions of the constitution and the bill of rights. It deserves every bit as much focus and attention as our foreign policy. And I will be keeping this kicked for a while.

[Selwynn]

3. Kick