Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision

Dom

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Part of the Patriot Act, a central plank of the Bush Administration's war on terror, was ruled unconstitutional by a federal judge on Wednesday.

U.S. District Judge Victor Marreo ruled in favor of the American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the power the FBI has to demand confidential financial records from companies as part of terrorism investigations.

The ruling was the latest blow to the Bush administration's anti-terrorism policies.

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that terror suspects being held in places like Guantanamo Bay can use the American judicial system to challenge their confinement. That ruling was a defeat for the president's assertion of sweeping powers to hold "enemy combatants" indefinitely after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The ACLU sued the Department of Justice, arguing that part of the Patriot legislation violated the constitution because it authorizes the FBI to force disclosure of sensitive information without adequate safeguards.

The judge agreed, stating that the provision "effectively bars or substantially deters any judicial challenge."

Under the provision, the FBI did not have to show a judge a compelling need for the records and it did not have to specify any process that would allow a recipient to fight the demand for confidential information.

http://news.yahoo.com/

raid517

I hope America regains it's sense of freedom and intergrity soon. As I have said many times in the past in the face of terror, the real battle should always have been to fight with everything at our disposal to preserve the freedoms we have - not to seek in any way to deliberately deminish them - because that is exactly the victory that the terrorists seek.

If the cost of winning is to give up on freedom, how and in what way is that winning at all?

GJ

Dom

Amen to that.

Bruuce

I agree.

pr0digal jenius

i will tertiarily concur

dj_stick

what i can't believe is that they actually tried this in the first place

Dom

Well, the Senate never read it, they just approved it. Supposedly because Bush threatened them that if they did not approve it or took too long in approving it, if there was a terrorist attack during that time he would blame it on them for not giving him the necessary tools.

The_Neon_Cowboy

http://9/ts_nm/rights_patriot_dc

nice link I enjoyed the firewall going crazy from the local connect attempt from 0.0.0.0.9

here is the proper link

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...hts_patriot_dc


The ruleing was also suspended by the same judge to allow the government time to file a (I foget the dang word ) but to make a attempt to have the ruleing over turned...

Well, that wich is being protected is a protection for criminals and terroists. People that are on the up and up have nothing to fear do they not?. What the freedom to do something illegal and get possably away with it? isn't this the same ACLU that also defends criminals and pedofiles?

a bit of unknown (looks like it was written bay an extremeist but has tru points)

http://members.fortunecity.com/gogod...ralLetter.html

pushing for religious stuff to be removed etc
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...931EDT7403.DTL

the ACLU good things and alot of very very bad

the goverment does alot of stuff weather you know it or not. Who polices the police? no one! also you don't think the government or law enforce ment will waste a send of thier time on you unless they suspect something in the first place.

Dom

The link is fixed, thank you. And it wasn't intentional.

raid517

@neon Yes but rights are rights. It really is that simple. The law was originally put in place to protect the rights of everyone - the innocent as well as the accused. The idea that the government can't just snoop on anyone's private financial (or other) affairs without due course and reference to the law governing such matters is meant to protect you from this kind of snooping as much as it is meant to protect anyone else. These are simple safegaurds against allowing our governments to become dictatorships - a reminder if you will that ultimately it is the people who should retain the power to call their government to account and not vice versa.

Time and again however you and others like you have shown a singular innability to understand such concepts. So long as there is food in your belly, a roof over your head, you have a car to drive and some money in the bank - what use to you are 'rights?'

That unfortunately is exactly how many poor Gemans thought after the German ecconomy collapsed in the late 1920's. Then too someone rose to power by simply promising the people food, jobs and prosperity - and also strong government. Then too they created an enemy in their midst and set about limiting the rights of the people, telling them all the while that this was needed in order to defeat those who would otherwise undermine the values of what they unshakingly believed was the greatest society on Earth. No one fought very hard to stop them until it was all too late - and we all know utimately where exactly where that led us to.

While this may or may not be an extreme example - there are at least several parallels that can be drawn with the current state of affairs. Your argument is that providing no one offends the will of the government - or any laws they seek to introduce (or in this instance break) we have little to fear from the increased power and influence of government. Clearly however this may do very little to prevent the government from adopting what could too easily ultimately become a dictatorship by degrees. This too is also how many Germans once felt. 'If I do not offend the will of my government, then why on Earth should I fear that they will ever come after me?' Unfortunately history has shown time and again when people are willing to surrender their rights and grant their government excessive powers (particularly to become law makers, or to exist outside of the law) they almost invaraiably do.

However I still feel there are some other things I should clarify for you.

When you ask who governs the police, the answer is not indeed 'no one', because it is in fact the courts. Maybe you are curious about who governs the courts? Well again you might think the answer is themselves - but once more this is not true, because utimately (in your country at least) it is the local government and state legalatives that are responsible for passing laws at a local level, and above these, the Congress and the Senate that have utimate responsibility for passing new laws that in large part are envisaged to affect everyone. All of these bodies it should perhaps be pointed out exist as an expression of the public will (which is why you have elections) and as much as possible they are intended to remain answerable to the people, rather than to the government. (Or at least that is the ideal). (Remember, government by the people, for the people and on behalf of the people). At no time in any of this process should the government have any say whatsoever in this process - because this directly interferes with the founding principal that it is the people who control the govenment - and not the government who are in control of them.

In other words, the government should have no powers whatsoever to set aside the law - because if they do - the instant they are granted this power it becomes government by the government, for the government and on behalf of the government - and the people can simply be cut directly out of the equation.

If you grant the government these powers, then in essence you pervert and cast aside everything that is worthwhile about your society. Freedom is a complicated thing, it is also often a difficult thing to maintain - but no matter how hard it is, it is not worthwhile to loose it, or to surrender it simply because we are too afraid, or too lazy to do what is needed to defend it.

When an enemy comes to your country and is said to be resentful of your freedoms - when he attacks you and tries his hardest to try to limit - or take some of these freedoms away from you, you all no doubt curse him and wish him nothing but harm. Why then if after such things do occur, when your government actively complies with the terrorists - and seeks itself to set about limiting your freedoms or restricting your rights, do you not also view them as your enemy too? After all, their aims are the same and the objectives appear virtually identical, which are to limit the rights, freedoms and privliges you currently enjoy - by whatever means they have at their disposal. Why then when one group seek to do this do you become angry and vengful - and when another does it you feel that somehow this is in some way any more acceptable?

If we ignore this, if we simply allow government to become an entity onto itself, then we must inevitably one day ask, who exactly governs the government? For clearly it is no longer the people.

The role of the government should be to act within the law - and the law itself should be no more than a direct expression of the public will. At no time should the government themselves seek to become a 'law making body' - because when they do, that is inevitably the point at which democracy ends and dictatoship begins.

The government, if you will remember, are supposed to only be an expression of the executive branch of the people (the board of directors as it were) and as such they should exist purely in their capacity to express as best they can whatever will of the people might be. How best they achieve this they are allowed to hold certain opinions on - but this does not mean they should be granted any right to simply dispense with the will of the people - or with the law, or indeed with the consitution, whenever such a law or other expression of public will should somehow suddenly seem inconvenient to them.

That is not just bad government - that is indeed the worst kind of government of all.

Best regards,

GJ

raid517

Sorry if my original post was a little garbled. I was in a hurry. Hopefully easier to read now.

GJ