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From: "Corn-Revere, Robert L." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Declan McCullagh (E-mail)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Freedom v. Fear Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 10:36:24 -0500 http://www5.law.com/lawcom/displayid.cfm?statename=DC&docnum=102784&table=news&flag=full --- By Robert Corn-Revere Legal Times The war against terrorism is a war to preserve freedom, we are told. The president explained that the terrorists "hate us for our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other." But even as he spoke, the Federal Bureau of Investigation was rounding up an undisclosed number of people for indeterminate periods of detention, and the attorney general has refused to release any substantive information on the practices. In defending these and other actions before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Dec. 6, Attorney General John Ashcroft claimed that those who ask whether we are sacrificing too much freedom "only aid terrorists, for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve." If irony is not dead, it surely is on life support. In a two-week period in October, the Justice Department announced a policy authorizing the interception of attorney-client conversations with detainees, a program of profiling and interviewing thousands of Arab men, and the creation of secret military tribunals to try immigrants and other foreigners suspected of terrorism. More significant than these executive actions was Congress' passage of the anti-terrorism bill -- the USA Patriot Act -- signed by President George W. Bush on Oct. 26. While some parts of the act provided needed adjustments to the law, its far-reaching provisions affect the rights of all citizens, and not just terrorism suspects. For example, the act minimizes judicial supervision of telephone and Internet surveillance, expands the government's ability to conduct secret searches, and gives the attorney general and the secretary of state the power to designate domestic groups as "terrorist organizations." The law also gives the FBI broad access to sensitive medical, financial, mental health, and educational records about individuals without having to show evidence of a crime and without a court order. [...] ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. Declan McCullagh's photographs are at http://www.mccullagh.org/ To subscribe to Politech: http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
