I keep asking what Constitutional rights I lost with the Patriot Act. No one can provide any that actual are rights.
Here, let me enlighten you. I'll do better that Patriot Act, I'll give the last 10 years:
Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA)
Allows law enforcement and intelligence agencies to conduct electronic surveillance by requiring that telecommunications carriers and manufacturers of telecommunications equipment to modify and design their equipment, facilities, and services to ensure that they have built-in surveillance capabilities, allowing federal agencies to accesses recorded telephone, broadband internet.
USA Patriot Act, October 2001
USA Patriot Act was passed on October 26, 2001. The legislative process formulated on a “window of hysteria” to grant unchecked, arguably unconstitutional powers to the President. It also created three major civil liberties threats in the process:
- Fifth and Fourteen Amendment due process rights by permitting indefinite detentions of undocumented immigrants that can now apply to anyone anywhere in the world; more on that below;
The Homeland Security Act (HSA) of November 25, 2002
Combined previously separately controlled government agencies into a centralized military/law-enforcement power under a common authority. The Act also approved a
domestic intelligence agency data base called the ‘Directorate for Information. Analysis and Infrastructure Protection;’. It's role is to create and maintain an all-inclusive intrusive public and private information data base on everyone. It can include virtually everything - financial transactions and records, medical ones, emails, phone calls, purchases, books and publications read, organization memberships, and any other personal habit or pattern.
--First Amendment loss of freedom of association that the Supreme Court considers an essential part of free expression; now anyone may be charged and prosecuted because of his or her claimed association with an "undesirable group;" and
- Fourth Amendment rights to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, and as a consequence, the loss of privacy; the Act grants the administration unchecked surveillance powers to access personal records; monitor financial transactions; student records; conduct "sneak and peak" searches through "delayed notice" warrants; authorize roving wiretaps; track emails, internet and cell phone use; use secret evidence in prosecutions; deny immigrants the right to counsel if they're unable to get their own; and ends built-in safeguards to let domestic criminal and foreign intelligence operations share information so CIA can now spy domestically.
The Act also creates the federal crime of "domestic terrorism" that broadens the definition and applies to US citizens. It is directs criminal law violations considered “domestic terrorist acts” if they aim to "influence (government policy) by intimidation, or coercion, or intimidation. By this definition, anti-war or justice/law demonstrations, environmental activism, civil disobedience and dissentience could be labled "domestic terrorism."
The Detainee Treatment Act of 2005
Denies detainees habeas rights, let US forces use any cruel, abusive, inhumane or degrading treatment in the interests of "national security," prohibited detainees from bringing suits as a result, and allowed statements gotten coercively to be used as evidence against them.
The Military Commissions Act of 2006
The arguably unconstitutional power to detain, interrogate and prosecute alleged terror suspects and anyone claimed to be their supporters. It also allows the President call anyone, anywhere in the world an "unlawful enemy combatant" and empowers him to arrest and incarcerate those labeled indefinitely in military prisons without needing corroborating evidence proving guilt.
-- legalizing “approved” interrogation techniques (torture, ie: water boarding) against anyone and lets the President decide what procedures can be used on his own authority;
-- denying detainees international law protection and lets the executive interpret it;
-- empowering the President to convene "military commissions" to try anyone he designates an "unlawful enemy combatant,".
--denying speedy trials or any at all;
-- permitting hearsay and secret evidence to be used
-- denying due process
Revising the 1807 Insurrection Act and Ending 1878 Posse Comitatus Protection (John Warner Defense Authorization Act)
On October 17, 2006, the president privately signed into law a hidden provision in Sections 1076 and 333 of the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007. It amended the Insurrection Act of 1807 and Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 that prohibit using federal and National Guard troops for law enforcement inside the country except as constitutionally allowed. The president can now claim a “public emergency” and declare martial law, suspend the Constitution for "national security," and deploy federal and National Guard troops within the nation.
Sections 1615 and 1622 of the 2008 Defense Authorization Act
These provisions authorize DOD to militarize the country under martial law by merging the military with state and local law enforcement during a national emergency described as "an incident of national significance or a catastrophic incident." It also gives the Defense Secretary extraordinary power to determine what military capabilities are needed, to provide them to "active (and) reserve components of the armed forces for homeland defense missions, domestic emergency responses, and (to provide) military support to civil authorities (for) at least five years."
“Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act of 2008”
Twenty Democrats voted for the bill, including Sen. Barack Obama, who has been criticized by his supporters for caving to Republican pressures. The initial bill was Created 30 years ago in response to Watergate and the Vietnam War, the original FISA law sought to prevent government abuse of surveillance power by establishing a secret court to oversee and approve government wiretapping activities. After 9/11, President Bush sidestepped FISA courts by authorizing warrantless wiretapping with the cooperation of telecommunications companies.
The FISA amendments are centered on giving telecommunications companies that cooperated with the government retroactive immunity. That means citizens who were spied upon through phone or computer lines without the consent of the secret FISA court have no legal recourse for the violation of their civil liberties. This sets a dangerous precedent for the future, sending the message that the government will protect companies that abet them in violating citizens' civil liberties.
“Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act” (Currently not enacted however, it overwhelming passed congress (405 to 6), and is fully supported by President Obama).
This bill has been deemed the end of Free Speech in America. It's worded in a clever way that could allow the U.S. government to arrest and incarcerate any individual who speaks out against the current administration, the wars, the Department of Homeland Security or any government agency.
The federal Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act
Media driven frenzies fueled by the government’s compulsion for control have destroyed ten of thousand of lives. Minor crimes such as urinating in public, owning a house where minors act mischievously, being 18 and engaging in sex with a 17 year old, accessing internet pornography in your own home and not properly supervising your children lands people on the same list as rapists, pedophiles and other true deviants. There is not another country in the world that extensivly promotes it’s “Sex Offender List” like the US, despite having little to no effect apprehending criminals. The public spectacle pf the “list” is merely an individual’s destruction tool. It assures that people can’t get jobs, can’t live where they can afford, can’t go were the need to go and becomes dependent on the state for their existence.
Executive Order Amending Executive Order 12425
The order grants Interpol two key privileges with in the US. 1. Allows Interpol the ability to operate within the territorial limits of the United States without being subject to the same constitutional restraints (the few that are left) that apply to all domestic law enforcement agencies. 2. Exempts Interpol’s domestic facilities, including its office within the U.S. Department of Justice, from search and seizure by U.S. authorities and from Freedom of Information Act disclosures.
Further Bastardization of the Justice System
The ongoing eroding of the US’s justice system has become very, very well known over the past ten years. The system allows Federal prosecutors to corrupt the spirit of Justice by: 1. Establish charges on various vague laws. 2. Coheres defendant testimony by bribes such as freedom, material items, dropped charges, etc. (The standing joke within the system is that it entices defendants to “Compose rather than to sing”: that is to make testimony up). 3. Make draconian threats using the harsh Federal imprisonment. The merits of a prosecutor are on “conviction rate” in lieu of justice being served. This is one of the reason the US imprison four time more people that the next country, Russia.
Operation FALCON
FALCON ("Federal and Local Cops Organized Nationally) was successful in Rounding up more than 30,000 criminals. But FALCON was the first ploy at centralizing all levels law enforcement power through Washington These levels included Federal, state, municipal and local authorities for Washington’s absolute control.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration endorsing “Blood Sucking”
Texas and Idaho DOTs have allowed blood to drawn from those suspected of drunken or drugged driving at routine traffic stops. This would allow a officer that you smarted-off to remove you from your vehicle, draw your blood and detain you pending test results. The Feds are fully endorsing this procedure and encouraging other states to implement it as well.
Unsustainable Budget Allocations
The government has endorsed a near “blank check” to Military, NSA and law enforcement agencies. The previous administration grew the government by an incredible 29% mostly in these agencies. The current administration has endorsed the same policies. This “blank check” mentality is in the wake of trillion dollar deficits unsustainable debt. The current administration is spending 42 cents of every dollar as debt. This debt is borrowed from foreign entities to “protect” us from foreign entities (if that make sense). Obviously this debt funding in will cease sooner or later. When that happens where will the funding, to protect future generations, come from?
Government Secrecy Strategies
The forming of PRIVATE, Government appointed/funded entities has been one of the most lucrative and nontransparent in our history. The Freedom of Information Act has been weakened as is powerless in accessing information from these Government funded Not for Profit agencies. Additionally, there has been an ongoing campaign of reclassification and increased secrecy by federal agencies (including the expansion of a catch-all category of "sensitive but unclassified"), and has made sweeping claims of "state secrets" to stymie judicial review of many of its policies that infringe on civil liberties. In general the government has moved to overclassifing information and has engaged in outright censorship
Use of Mercenary Contractors
Blackwater has been described as "the world's most powerful mercenary army" and "a shadowy mercenary company (employing) some of the most feared professional killers in the world). The use of contractors like Blackwater allow for operating without worry of international legal consequences and for “off the congressional radar” operations.
Medical records Act 2003
Various State’s Civil Rights encroachments
(Remember with the new ‘Directorate for Information. Analysis and Infrastructure Protection’ of the HAS Act; personal information accrued by states are entered in the Federal data base).
Note: these laws are not applicable in all States.
1. Forced submission to giving a DNA sample if you are “suspected” felon or “person of interest”. Basically anyone that the government wants a DNA sample from.
2. Attachment of a GPS tracking system to the underside of one’s vehicle. Again this falls under the “person of interest” category.
3. Voter disenfranchisement laws: Deny voting rights to individuals who have been convicted of felonies. Basically if someone makes a mistake, DWI, Grabs a girlfriend, downloads the wrong thing on their PC, shoots oneself with an unregistered gun, has sex with a 17 year old, etc, that person can never vote again.
4. Domestic Violence restraining orders: (sometimes called protective orders) issued under civil law, have the effect of vacating the “suspect” from his/her home, prohibiting assess to personal property and restricting contact with his/he children. Half of these restraining orders do not involve even an allegation of violence. It is estimated that most restraining orders are used by spouses as retaliatory measures.
5. Domestic Violence child removal: This allows agencies to make the determination to remove your children and place them in locations unbeknown to you. You children could be removed from your family and placed in a neglective foster home (with 8, or so, other kids that have been subjected to, who knows what) and you do not know where they are. Your friends and relatives (that you trust) will not be considered in this placement.
6. Sleeping in Public Places: Imposing and enforcing harsh anti-homeless laws at a time of growing poverty and economic desperation is cruel and shortsighted. For harassing, rather than protecting, the most vulnerable, the criminalization of homelessness.
7. California passed legislation allowing police to conduct warrantless searches of iPhones, laptops, and similarly capacious electronic gadgets.
8. A Washington appeals court judge approved law enforcement attaching GPS to an automobile that is parked on private property, The Judge maintains “there is no reasonable expectation of privacy” in you driveway.
