Rage against the Machine
columnist: Chad_Underdonk

Topic: Patriot Act
The threat of the Patriot Act

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A critical reply to "The Importance of the Patriot Act" by Analysis

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by Chad_Underdonk
(Libertarian)
Sunday, March 23, 2008

This article is a response to The Importance of the Patriot Act by Analysis. First let me introduce you to a little thought experiment based on on the slightest number of suppositions.

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ACT I

I am highly critical of "our" government, those who run it, and the forces behind the power. I own a copy of the Anarchists Cookbook, which I bought 15 years ago and stupidly paid for with a check card. I own several potent firearms, and a small mountain of ammunition. I was in the military and could possibly pass on some of the basic infantry training which I received to other people. I have posted my name widely across the internet on various sites as a way to empower my opinions and NOT hide behind a false face; some of those postings have undoubtedly upset some people, and some of the things I've said could undoubtedly be construed by the histrionic "protect me" folks as dangerous. By all of these things listed here I could theoretically be considered a terroristic threat or already be on a watch list.

Theoretically anyone who comes into contact with me in any form could be a part of my theoretical terror ring. Anyone who comes into contact with me could possibly have a "piece of the puzzle" which explains what my goals are and what I intend to do next. These contacts could be presumed to go so far as people that I interact with on websites, they could even be anyone ON THIS WEBSITE. By my posting this and your reading it YOU could in some form be in cahoots with me and you might now also be on a watchlist, or they might decide that you should be checked further.

ACT II

Now that you are on a watchlist someone, possibly even an automated process, decides to conduct a check on you. This may be a simple check, but perhaps enough red flags pop up because of the amount of people you know who are also connected to me (through the six degrees of Kevin Bacon terror plot), or perhaps because your cousin owns a farm and you have easy access to ammonium nitrate, or any other weird odd possibilty that you never considered before and virtually anyone would have a hard time making a plausible case for.

Based on these red flag factors you have been bumped up to a higher level list for closer scrutiny. Based on your preferences for communications devices and potential to be the vital link into a major terror ring they have decided to physically plant listening devices within your domicile. Some low level Department of Homeland Security drone reviews your files, and sees that you punch a time clock at 9am everyday at work, and that your wife also does the same. They find that you have 2 vehicles, and your home has no garage, and you therefore park on the street. The DHS drone writes a memo to the wire tapping crew that at 9:30 if no cars are home it should be safe and simple to enter your domicile to plant bugs. The wire tapping crew is quite busy and doesn't have the time at the moment to actually case your home and determine whether or not the information provided by the "omnipotent" DHS has provided and therefore decides to act upon that info.

ACT III

Your wifes car breaks down on the way home. Since your workplaces are in two opposite directions she calls in and uses a vacation day while you go off to work; she promptly goes back to sleep. The wiretapping crew conducts a no-knock entry into your home to begin planting bugs. Your 120 pounds German Shepherd comes snarling out of the kitchen and attempts to bite one of the DHS employees. The DHS employee throws a lamp to distract the dog. Your wife grabs the pistol from the nightstand and begins to move towards the hallway. The dog meanwhile attacks and is shot dead. Your wife rounds the corner to confront the armed and deadly people invading her home and is gunned down in a hail of DHS bullets.

After a super-sonic search of your home EVIDENCE IS PLANTED! THE COVER-UP ENSUES!

ACT IV

You are called to the receptionist desk at work. Handcuffed and drug off and put into solitary in a tiny room, in a tiny place, and are never given the opportunity to talk to a lawyer, hear the charges against you, or even learn that your wife has been shot down in a hail of gunfire. Someday if you are lucky some lawyer from the ACLU may wear down a federal judge enough to get him to make a ruling that you get the opportunity to have your case evaluated.

FINIS

While this may seem outlandish or even strange to you, this is all possible under the so-called "USA PATRIOT ACT" and its accompanying laws. This does not even taken into account the possibility of clerical errors, gross-incompetence, malign activities of your personal enemies, future shifts towards a totalitarian state, or any number of other issues which could cause you to be under heightened scrutiny some day. The fact is that without the legal road-blocks in the system that our government tends to take liberties with the rights of individuals. If a simple review of the wrong-doing associated with previous activities of our government when spying on its own people (see COINTELPRO) does not set off danger signals then I don't know what will. The fact is that national and local police agencies have been, are, and will continue to misuse the power of the Patriot Act to do unconscionable things and abuse the trust of the people. If the FBI with all its past integrity is misusing it repeatedly then you can be assured the rest of the government will as well.

The fact is that Governments have committed more attrocities and genocidal acts than any group of terrorists ever could (see Innocents Betrayed). To fear the little threat and completely trust the major threat is foolish in the extreme. Too much unchecked power, too much unwatched power, too much of any power is dangerous in an organization that is so powerful and so potential of misuse and abuse.

These final thoughts are what I replied to a woman in our local paper almost four years ago when she asked what was wrong with the patriot act:

Here's what's wrong with the Patriot Act

Mrs. Bayles' examples of the effectiveness of the Patriot Act would be much more reassuring if her sources were not the people who have the most to gain from the American Police State. It is the nature of government to amass as much power as it can, and there are those within it who have much to gain by speeding up that process.

The time has already come when "our" government has assumed the power to label citizens as enemy combatants based on evidence gathered by undisclosed methods, which is illegal to publicize, and cannot be challenged in open court (if at all). The time has come when we are tracked, monitored, and catalogued based upon our spending habits, our jobs, the places we frequent, our acquantainces, our literature, and the sites we visit online. Big Brother is not just an Orwellian nightmare, it is fast approaching reality.

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2008 Chad_Underdonk, all rights reserved.
Published: Sunday, March 23, 2008
Last modified: Sunday, March 23, 2008

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