I'd be happy if every idiot in Congress who voted for the Patriot Act was thrown out of office, and furthermore stripped of their American citizenship. Sure, this would mean most of Congress would be out of a job, and in Gitmo, but is that really such a bad thing?
The Swamp - Chicago Tribune - Blogs. :
The FBI has taken unchecked advantage of the “National Security Letters'' that enable it to obtain telephone calls, emails and banking records without warrants, according to an inspector general's report to be released today that reportedly will depict far-reaching abuses of the USA Patriot Act.
FBI agents have underreported their uses of this tool they were given after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, according to the report expected to be made public before noon. As it is, the FBI had reported to Congress that in 2005 it issued a total of 9,254 national security letters involving 3,501 U.S. citizens and legal residents. But shoddy record-keeping resulted in the FBI underreporting its use of these letters by 20 percent, the report by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine is said to conclude.
At least, mouth platitudes about over-turning it, please?
Some members of Congress were briefed on the report last night. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) issued this statement: ”In late 2005, I requested that the U.S. Department of Justice investigate the use of National Security Letters and other powers granted under the USA Patriot Act. The Justice Department’s own investigation, which is now concluded, confirms the American people’s worst fears about the Patriot Act. It appears that the Administration has used these powers without even the most basic regard for the privacy of innocent Americans.“I voted for the original Patriot Act in 2001 and I voted to reauthorize it last year, because I believe we should give the government all the tools it needs to fight terrorism,'' Durbin added. ”However, I continue to believe that the Patriot Act must include reasonable checks and balances to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans.“
It was unclear late Thursday whether the omissions could be considered a criminal offense. One government official who read the report said it concluded the problems appeared to be unintentional and that FBI agents would probably face administrative sanctions instead of criminal charges.The FBI has taken steps to correct some of the problems, the official said.
...
Sen. Charles Schumer, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that oversees the FBI, called the reported findings ”a profoundly disturbing breach of public trust.“”Somebody has a lot of explaining to do,“ said Schumer, D-N.Y.
Fine's audit also says the FBI failed to send follow-up subpoenas to telecommunications companies that were told to expect them, the officials said.
Those cases involved so-called exigent letters to alert the companies that subpoenas would be issued shortly to gather more information, the officials said. But in many examples, the subpoenas were never sent, the officials said.
....
National security letters have been the subject of legal battles in two federal courts because recipients were barred from telling anyone about them.
The American Civil Liberties Union sued the Bush administration over what the ACLU described as the security letter's gag on free speech.
A federal appeals judge in New York warned in May that government's ability to force companies to turn over information about its customers and keep quiet about it was probably unconstitutional.
Remember when the U.S. was a constitutional democracy? Oh, those were the days....
(link to report here - PDF file)
Tags: civil_liberties, /civil_rights, /FBI, /Patriot_Act, /surveillance
