You have to balance freedom with security. 9-11 did terrible things to America in more ways than one. Consider the fact that every new bill signed into law takes a little or big piece of freedom away from citizens. When we get the chance to roll back the power of the government to violate the 4th Amendment it's a good thing.
A question to you, do you know of any terrorist threat thwarted by the Patriotic act? The reason I ask as we have stats that tell us that S&F really does work, and has taken thousands of guns out of the hands of criminals in NYC, as if the person stopped did have a gun permit, he would be allowed to continue without being arrested and his weapon confiscated.
Seems to me the balance of S&F is in the favor of the people, I'm not so sure about the Patriot act.