Topic: Patriot Act
Bob Barr Voted for the Patriot Act but Says He is Sorry (PART 3/6) Pointed questions for Bob Barr on the USA Patriot Act, plus Clinton/Bush Impeachment, CIA, Marijuana, and being a Flip-Flopping Loserby Jake Towne, the Champion of the Constitution
(libertarian)
Friday, June 6, 2008
Dear Mr. Barr,
In October 2001, you voted for HR 3162, the USA PATRIOT Act (Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism). Writers here and here and Wiki claim you did this so you could nobly add a 5-year Sunset clause during the editing stage, and so save all of us from losing our Liberties Forever. And now you are Sorry. Save me the sob story and defend yourself. Here's why.
Well, first off let's take a closer look at your pet sunset clause from HR 3162 on page 25/132:
"Sec. 224 SUNSET
"(a) IN GENERAL - Except as provided in subsection (b), this title and the amendments made by this title (other than sections 203(a), 203(c), 205, 208, 210, 211, 213, 216, 219, 221, and 222, and the amendments made by those sections) shall cease to have effect on December 31, 2005.
"(b) EXCEPTION - With respect to any particular foreign intelligence investigation that began before the date on which the provisions referred to in subsection (a) cease to have effect, or with respect to any particular offense or potential offense that began or occurred before the date on which such provisions cease to have effect, such provisions shall continue in effect."
Alright dude, pardon me as while Americans were dying in Vietnam while you were in college and studying law from 1967-1977, I was not even born, so perhaps my intelligence is unable to comprehend this Legalese you helped write as a Lawyer. Well skipping over the fact that you did NOT sunset the whole bill, leaving 13 sections un-sunsetted, why praytell did you think such an powerful bill deserved to be in effect for 4 years and 2 months? Why was 3 months or 6 months not sufficient for us to catch the bad guys?
Second, section (b) says that as long as you start a (secret, I add) investigation before the sunset date, it can continue with the same powers as before the sunset date. So if I am the Government, why wouldn't I just start an investigation on December 30th of all 'suspect' citizens? I am not entertained in the least that you sold your vote for this weak sunset clause. And I thought your nickname from the press was "Mr. Privacy"?
Section 361 of the USA Patriot Act created FinCEN (the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network). FinCEN expanded the government and has been used to work with other countries to financially attack other sovereign nations. Witness the attack to freeze North Korean bank accounts in Macao, which most say was just a warm-up to March 2008's grand attack on Iran.
Mr. Privacy, FinCEN has helped to completely destroy what little financial privacy Americans had left. Section 365 makes it legal for the government to spy and monitor on transactions involving more than $10,000 - was this not used to bring Eliot Spitzer to 'justice'? Section 371 makes it illegal for private citizens to transport bulk cash internationally. So let me get this straight - it is legal for the Government to print up, transport (and then lose track of) 363 tons of crisp Ben Franklins to Iraq, but it's illegal for me to transport more than 100 Bennies on my person? And $10,000 doesn't go nearly as far as it did in 2001, more on that later.
Next issue on the Patriot Act is how comes you believe it acceptable to quote a law from some other document, then just list the replacements that just mention the editing? Example from Section 207 (a) (2):
"PHYSICAL SEARCH - Section 304(d)(1) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1824(d)(1)) is amended by -
(A) striking "forty-five" and inserting "90";
(B) inserting "(A)" after "except that"; and
(C) inserting before the period the following: ", and (B) an order under this section for a physical search targeted against an agent of a foreign power as defined in section 101(b)(1)(A) may be for the period specified in the application of for 120 days, whichever is less"."
The entire PATRIOT Act is rife with examples such as the above. I have no idea what this means and I simply don't have the time right now to go to the FISA or any of the other countless laws referred to. I just think this is wrong. As a Lawyer, as a former Representative of We the People, do you not find this ethically wrong? or do you just think its Funny writing laws that require the average American to have a Legal Dictionary and access to these other multiple other documents? You must think We are either "Idiots" or We have a lot of spare time on our hands. How could you do this to me, Bob?
I am dumber for having read the 132 pages of the USA Patriot Act found here. However, there is one more thing that really irks me. The bill was signed and passed only 5 weeks after 9/11. From the complexity of the document, it seems to me that right after 9/11 Bush would have had to dedicate a team of Lawyers like yourself to write such a document, so my suspicions are that this document was ready long before 9/11, and was just rolled out on cue as America was laid up in a figurative stretcher on life support. Tell me, was it?
Well, saying you were sorry once doesn't cut it for me Bob, what else can you do? My suggestion is to say you are sorry for violating our privacy and freedom by voting for the USA PATRIOT Act at the start of every campaign speech you make. YOU CAN ALSO WRITE IT DOWN ON YOUR WEBSITE IN CAPITAL LETTERS LIKE THIS. That way you won't forget.
My fingers are starting to cramp and I have a plane to catch so rather than keep writing on more mundane topics like your stance on marriage and human rights, I am going to call it quits here and move on to monetary policy, but first are a few more quick questions for you:
Your initial claim to fame was you were the one to introduce a resolution favoring Impeachment proceedings against Clinton (Bill, not Hillary) although this was for campaign fundraising from foreign sources, not Lewinsky. However, when the Lewinsky indiscretions were made known, you were still one of the 13 House prosecutors during the Senate proceedings. It must have been great being a big-time lawyer and being so important for awhile. So, where do you stand with the Bush administration? If you were in Congress now, would you be impeaching Bush and Cheney? If elected, are you going to pardon them? Or are you a hypocrite once more? According to Wiki, American Journalism Review found that invoked legal privilege during your 1985 divorce proceeding so you could refuse to answer questions on whether you cheated on your Second Wife with the woman who is now your Third Wife. So did you help impeach a President for cheating on his wife and lying about it, while having cheated on one of your wives yourself, or not? I'm listening.
So per Wiki you were in the CIA from 1970 to 1978, which overlaps much of the time you were in law school. Why and what were you doing there? Please don't say it was to get a good deal on your law school loans or you were writing the USA Patriot Act's first draft. As you are aware, many view the CIA as a shifty organization since they have started a lot of wars, coups, and other wildly productive activities like that, all in the name of National Security. Oh, I forgot, per the 9/11 Commission Report, the CIA also twiddles its thumbs instead of capturing or even murdering Bin Laden in the 1990s, so maybe you just twiddled thumbs?
Per Wiki, after working as the Anti-Drug coordinator for the Department of Justice, you were a strong supporter and a member of the Task Force for a Drug-Free America and created laws with the expressed goal of "winning the War on Drugs by 2002." Umm, I think you lost that Drug war, but nevermind that piddling detail, as we had the bigger and badder Global War on Terror kick off in 2001, which you voted for per the prior article. From 1998-2002, you single-handedly stopped legislation intended to legalize Medicinal Marijuana. Then in 2007, you befriended and became a Lobbyist (Lawyer-Lobbyist sure sounds scary!) for the PRO-Drug Marijuana Policy Project. And you love to state that you are NOT pro-drug, but its simply hard to rationalize the MPP as anything other than pro-drug. Why the flip-flop sir?
Well, that brings me to my last point. Which is You are a Loser. In 2002, you were voted out of office and the opposition had 70% of the vote, although apparently the redistricting was not in your favor. To lose your last election does not bode well for a Presidential race. The Libertarian Party destroyed you with killer TV ads like Why Would You Do that to Me, Bob?
So you've completely flip-flopped on the Patriot Act, Drugs, and the Global War on Terror. And you've worked in politics for most of your life, including almost 10 official years in the CIA, a spy agency. Why should I vote for you? Because you offer some half-baked pie of Liberty that tastes better than McClinama? Why did you not refer to Ron Paul's support for you in your 10-minute long Presidential acceptance speech? Bob, are you a CIA plant? Are you planning to destroy or oppress the Libertarian Party who soundly beat you in 2002 as some sort of twisted revenge? Are you here to destroy the Revolution?
Signed, a Ron Paul Revolutionary,
Jake, the Champion of the Constitution
COMING UP NEXT: Monetary Policy, the Missing Plank in Barr's Platform
The views expressed in this
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FinCEN was created by the USA PATRIOT Act?! Lol. duuuhhhh.
Could you be more uninformed or confused?
Barr did a lot more than put in the sunset clauses. In fact he was key in drafting an very different draft of the bill which was pulled at the last minute at the insistence of the White House. It seems that if *you* were against the PATRIOT Act at the time, you would have been following the news, and calling Congress, and you would know this. Why don't you? Were *you* not against the USA PATRIOT Act in 2001?
Barr pissed off Karl Rove so bad over this PATRIOT stuff that Rove/White House threw is support behind Rep. Linder in the primary. That's what defeated Barr, not the LNC's ad campaign. That's just delusional. Too bad the LNC wasted all that money in spring 2002 interfering in Republican & Democrat primary elections... instead of bulding up LP candidates in the fall. The LP has been destroying itself for a long time, it didn't need Barr's help.
Posted By: Jake, the champion of the constitution
Date: 2008-06-25 09:09:45
Dear fred jones,
You state Barr did a lot more than put in the sunset clauses that I so disliked in the article and drafted a very different draft of the bill. Where is your documentation for it, and if it was so different, I am confused as why Barr still voted for it?
Sorry for not being too into American politics in 2001, I was still in high school getting laughed at for being good at math. I hope you laughed yourself to sleep with what I wrote. Please try to educate me a bit more next time, it appears I still sorely need it.
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