11 September 2011

How the "Patriot Act" has been used

Delayed-notice search warrants issued under the expanded powers of the Patriot Act, 2006–2009.
When it was signed into law six weeks after the attacks, the act made it easier to wiretap American citizens suspected of cooperating with terrorism, to snoop through business records without notification, and to execute search warrants without immediately informing their targets (a so-called sneak-and-peek). Privileges once reserved for overseas intelligence work were extended to domestic criminal investigations. There was less judicial oversight and very little transparency.
Text and image from New York Magazine, via prima mangiare e dopo filosofare.

5 comments:

  1. ... and there's a lot more to it - some of which remains classified.

    It's interesting how few Americans seem to notice the parallels between the USA PATRIOT act and the Reichstag Fire Decree.

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  2. I envy people who reached adulthood before 9/11 because it seems like Americans were freer then. I turned 19 less than two weeks after the attacks, so I was just becoming an adult when the country changed. From where I stand that change is almost 100% negative.

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  3. Well of course they used the authority for drug raids; that's where the money is.

    Police departments across the US have been distorted into drug raiders; plunderers behind badges.

    Drug plunder feeds the budget beast, and because it does more and more gear and training is geared toward future drug raids to get more loot.

    Do you think that busting terrorist cells is anywhere near as profitable? Not likely.

    No agency, however lionized, is immune to economics.

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  4. Too bad they're not using even a fraction of that tax grab to go after the real terrorists - namely the greedy Wall St scumbags and their all-too complicit, lapdog ppolitician pals.

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  5. Woh. I'd like to see a further breakdown of type of drug investigated. How many of these are for marijuana?
    There seems to be a spreading belief, at least among republicans, that everybody in America should be subjected to living in constant fear. What a bummer. If they win the next election, we should expect this type of governance for a generation.

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