Patriots against the Patriot Act

Sorry MA, I should've posted it here.

JN, until the provisions of the Patriot Act affect you as deeply as they are affecting tranquil, aware and running-for-the-hills American colleagues all, you should post freely wherever you wish!!!!

This thread has taken on some elements of survival of the fittest and Darwinism (as promulgated by William, late August 2003)...

Worse extensions of the Patriot Act and incursions into everyday law will happen than even these...

story.news.yahoo.com.../ap/20030914/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/anti_terror_laws_2



Some morsels:


* Police and prosecutors have increasingly turned the force of the new laws not on al-Qaida cells but on people charged with common crimes.

* Federal prosecutors used the act in June to file a charge of "terrorism using a weapon of mass destruction" against a California man after a pipe bomb exploded in his lap, wounding him as he sat in his car.

* "Within six months of passing the Patriot Act, the Justice Department was conducting seminars on how to stretch the new wiretapping provisions to extend them beyond terror cases," said Dan Dodson, a spokesman for the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys. "They say they want the Patriot Act to fight terrorism, then, within six months, they are teaching their people how to use it on ordinary citizens."

* Federal prosecutors have brought more than 250 criminal charges under the law, with more than 130 convictions or guilty pleas.

* The law, passed two months after the Sept. 11 attacks, erased many restrictions that had barred the government from spying on its citizens, granting agents new powers to use wiretaps, conduct electronic and computer eavesdropping and access private financial data.

* Stefan Cassella, deputy chief for legal policy for the Justice Department's asset forfeiture and money laundering section, said that while the Patriot Act's primary focus was on terrorism, lawmakers were aware it contained provisions that had been on prosecutors' wish lists for years and would be used in a wide variety of cases.

* The complaint that anti-terrorism legislation is being used to go after people who aren't terrorists is just the latest in a string of criticisms. More than 150 local governments have passed resolutions opposing the law as an overly broad threat to constitutional rights.

* "We've already heard stories of local police chiefs creating files on people who have protested the Iraq war ... The government is constantly trying to expand its jurisdictions, and it needs to be watched very, very closely."

Unbalanced.

I agree with what you said. I think the plan is to go back to indentured servants in which debtors must go to prison and then have the chance to work that off for way below minimum wage. It is already happening with criminal and more and more prisons are being structured this way.

I see this current stock rally(which I predicted) is all smoke and mirrors and highly manipulated. I predict a crash that will be nothing like the slow drip in 2000.
Kinda like a last man out rally...... But I think it will last for another year just in time for Bush to get re-elected.
That is why I have been been long stocks since October 2002.

Originally posted by EPLURIBUSUNUM
That is why I have been been long stocks since October 2002.

EPU

Your theory of indentured servitude is very interesting. It is vital to keep the masses occupied on the treadmill (whether in prison or "free") and chasing little material rewards, or at least a better beer or whiskey for those in the trailer parks.

But I can't follow what you said in the last sentence, though I suspect it is simply that you have exited stocks as an investment strategy. Please explain (being sure that nothing about money that you say could be construed as ill-gotten funds, in case some idiot Patriot Act trigger-happy official is reading).


**** Answer for the friendly member who U2U'd me: "idiot Patriot Act trigger-happy official" is not a known ATS member identity, it is just a generic category of idiot ****

[Edited on 15-9-2003 by MaskedAvatar]

Originally posted by Bob88
I�ll play devils advocate: As much as I'd prefer to just see the patriot act go away, myself (along with terrorists), I'd still like to see someone give me something, perhaps just some bullet points of intelligent reasons the patriot act has sparked a civil rights crisis in America under the �Ashcroft reign of terror�.

Pardon if I retravel where others have already gone, but I have read where some have been nabbed as terrorists under this Patriot Notion who are actually normal, run of the mill drug manufactuter/peddlers, and a dud who made a pipe bomb. Mr.PipeBombDude got in trouble for manufacturing a Weapon of Mass Destruction. That is an insult, ferring to a pipe bomb as an WDM.

Hmmm... wonder why he gets all defensive about it???

Attorney General John Ashcroft denounced as "hysteria" the contention by some librarians and civil liberties groups that the FBI can use a new anti-terror law to snoop into Americans' reading habits.

In a speech Monday to an American Restaurant Association conference, Ashcroft said people are being wrongly led to believe that libraries have been "surrounded by the FBI," with agents "dressed in raincoats, dark suits and sunglasses. They stop everyone and interrogate everyone like Joe Friday.

A portion of the Patriot Act, passed shortly after the 2001 terror attacks, gives federal authorities access to library, bookstore and other business records as part of terrorism investigations. Some libraries have begun purging their records more frequently and posting signs warning that the records could be checked by the FBI.

"The hysteria is ridiculous. Our job is not," Ashcroft said.

abcnews.go.com...

People seem to be tetchy over the library and bookstore stuff. I doubt that there will be any arrests specifically over borrowing certain books from your local library. If the books were problematic, then under a totalitarian regime they should have been removed by the a$$lickers of A$$croft in the first place.

BUt iff anyone is ever under investigation for something they have borrowed from a local public library, they should be able to sue for entrapment.

And, by the same token, if there really is a terrorist element to any such book in question, then under Patriot and Victory the totalitarian regime should now also be able to sue the author, the publisher, the wholesaler and the bookseller for profiting from terrorist activity, and freeze the asset base of every individual and corporation in that chain (and all assets of every family member of every employee as well, of course) under the terrorist support and money laundering provisions.

The Acts are really good for that sort of stuff.

The American legal system, always a bastion of stupidity, is only just cranking up for the stuff that will go on under these Acts.

The legislation that is being passed seems to put everyone at risk to have legal action taken against them for whatever the a$$lickers want.
Like the realease of toxic chemicals>businesses,corporations,farmers....
Just about anyone that they could choose to move against,and basically with no recourse to those who would find themselves targeted.
Something is up,I have known there was something afoot for years,it's beginning to look like the sheeples in the US have been snoozing for too long.
It is getting to the point that if you were to let an old lawnmower rust out and leak gas in your back yard,you would be an eco-terrorist,let alone if you owned and operated a scrapyard.Just think about those ships full of car batteries they send to asia for recycling,spewing battery acid out of their bilge pumps.
If you have wild hemp growing on your property,does that make you a narco-terrorist?.
This stuff is getting rediculous.
We need some continuity between the population here if anything is going to change,and we all know that won't happen unless people see how these laws are being abused by the sleazy lawyers here.
But somehow they have been duped into believing that lawyer are fine upstanding citizens.
I'm not afraid,I am frustrated,my stuff is packed and ready to go when the # hits the fan.
That is if I spot the chunks before they splatter on me.

Originally posted by uNBaLaNCeD
The legislation that is being passed seems to put everyone at risk to have legal action taken against them for whatever the a$$lickers want.

Unbalanced.

That's the general idea. Where is the problem? That seems to be in control to me, not out of control...

Originally posted by uNBaLaNCeD
...people see how these laws are being abused by the sleazy lawyers here.

I don't know if you've noticed this or not, but there's a very high percentage of politicians that used to be lawyers...

Have you noticed that lawyers like to call themselves "esquires",this term means shield bearer for/of the king,did you know that there used to be a 13th amendment that forbade holding public office by anyone who has ever held a title of royalty in the constitution?.
When the 13th amendment was fraudulently removed fron the constitution was when the US started it's decline,that was way back in 1812 or thereabouts.
If you look into this subject of the 13th amendment you will find some very interesting information about a lot of things.
Lawyers in politics are the problem,and the problem is not so much lawyers as the language they use,and not so much the language used as the fact that those who they supposedly serve (those=public/they=politicians and lawyers),have no idea that they are talking anything other than common english,and then there is this issue of ignorance to the fact that there may just be more to what people may be saying than the majority knows........
Anybody got a blue pill?,does it counteract the red pill?,or is it too late to go back to being an ignoramus?,I just want to go back and graze with my friends.

[Edited on 19-9-2003 by uNBaLaNCeD]

Yes, Esq. is an interesting little title, it is of the gentry ranking below a Knight.

Also colloquially it simply means an owner of land, or parted of the "landed" gentry. Which is why it doesn't annoy me so much when certain people address mail to me that way, I have never accepted any titles offered by the Queen at all.

Politicians in Politics is the problem... Be they Lawyer, which has been correctly pointed out here is the majority of them, or otherwise the personality required to actually get elected these days is not exactly full of the qualities one would associate with a leader...

IMHO the most important attribute required to get elected is the ability to raise funds. When you consider it takes > $1,000,000.00 to get into a "Local Government" elected position, i.e. Mayor of a large city, State Senator, etc... it becomes pretty scary.

While I have respect for the ability to EARN large sums of money by your wits and hard work, the ability to essentially "Grovel" for it by making promises of preferential treatment once in office I find distasteful to be sure...

Especially when it seems the only PURPOSE of these people is to perpetuate the power over the people by means of passing such drek as the Patriot Act...

MA: EU was indicating he has been "long on stocks" since Oct, 2002. Meaning he has been BUYING, in the beleif that the equity market will go UP in value rather than "Selling Short" which would indicate you beleive the equity market is going to decline in value.

His statement means he has NOT "given up" stocks as an investment tool, quite the opposite.

PEACE...
m...

as someone who loved freedom while he had it, i belive this PATRIOT act to be a weapon against the Patriots who see this for what it is. a way to keep people in line if they act up in these tough times. i refuse to accept this Act as a constitutional law, and will not abide by it while i live. if that makes me a terrorist, then so be it. but i'll have you know, the terrorist to the government is the peoples freedom fighter, and i along with many others, will risk our lives to ensure this doesn't result in tyranny.

why are we standing aside, as we sacrifice our freedom for security against an enemy who is invisible, and enemy who cannot be readily defeated. an enemy who once defeated will be replaced by others who think like him, and are inspired by what they fought for. they cannot keep us down. i will fight til the bitter end to revert america to the constitutional democracy it has been for two centuries, and no man will take that right from us. we will be free...

Phoenix

So there are fake U.S.A. P.A.T.R.I.O.T.s and real Patriots. just like there are fake 'presidents' and real Prseidents.

The most criminal thing about the war on terrorism is that the Bush administration are the worst terrorists of the lot, applying terrorist fear tactics to their own people. The war against the abstract noun gets more complex by your definitions. I still think A$$croft et al need to be tried under the provisions of this stupid Act like several other genuine terrorists, before it gets repealed.

Originally posted by uNBaLaNCeD
Have you noticed that lawyers like to call themselves "esquires",this term means shield bearer for/of the king,did you know that there used to be a 13th amendment that forbade holding public office by anyone who has ever held a title of royalty in the constitution

Actually, if you look a bit more closely in the main body of the Constitution, you'll see that it forbids anyone currently in Office to accept such titles (without first gaining the approval of Congress); Something that kind of troubles me is that I've learned that Bush *has* the royal title of Knight, granted by the Crown of England...What disturbs me is that I can't find out if Bush had Congress' permission to accept that title or not.
Kind of leads one to think that Bush is merely a Tool of the NWO & that his orders originate in England...It's precisely this reason why the Constitution forbids such duplicity.

Originally posted by MaskedAvatar
The most criminal thing about the war on terrorism is that the Bush administration are the worst terrorists of the lot, applying terrorist fear tactics to their own people....I still think A$$croft et al need to be tried under the provisions of this stupid Act like several other genuine terrorists, before it gets repealed.

I'd really *loooooooove* to see this type of poetic justice actually take place...
..."Hoist by their own petard", to coin a phrase...


[Edited on 21-9-2003 by MidnightDStroyer]

Before the Bush admin crooks are ever subjected to the provisions of the Patriot Act, I suspect it will be applied to many more categories of non-terrorist criminals and non-criminals.

Some weeks ago there was discussion about whether any particular rights were going to be eroded by the legislation and the investigative powers given to authorities. The evidence is mounting that the law is being used to pursue may avenues not related to terrorism, so that even if you are not related to or know any terrorists at all, your are subject to being caught in the web if they want to look at you for any reason.


www.tribnet.com...

Patriot Act not just for terror
ERIC LICHTBLAU; The New York Times

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration, which calls the USA Patriot Act perhaps its most essential tool in fighting terrorists, has begun using the law with increasing frequency in many criminal investigations that have little or no connection to terrorism.

The government is using its expanded authority under the far-reaching law to investigate suspected drug traffickers, white-collar criminals, blackmailers, child pornographers, money launderers, spies and even corrupt foreign leaders, federal officials said.

Justice Department officials say they are simply using all the tools now available to them to pursue criminals - terrorists or otherwise. But critics of the administration's antiterrorism tactics assert that such use of the law is evidence the administration has sold the American public a false bill of goods, using terrorism as a guise to pursue a broader law enforcement agenda.....

(THE POLICE STATE, THAT IS...)


.... A new Justice Department report, given to members of Congress this month, also cites more than a dozen cases that are not directly related to terrorism. In them, federal authorities have used their expanded power to investigate individuals, initiate wiretaps and other surveillance, or seize millions in tainted assets.

For instance, the ability to secure nationwide warrants to obtain e-mail and electronic evidence "has proved invaluable in several sensitive nonterrorism investigations," including the tracking of an unidentified fugitive and an investigation into a computer hacker who stole a company's trade secrets, the report said....

.... The authorities have also used toughened penalties under the law to press charges against a lovesick 20-year-old woman from Orange County, Calif., who planted threatening notes aboard a Hawaii-bound cruise ship she was traveling on with her family in May.

The woman, who said she made the threats to try to return home to her boyfriend, was sentenced this week to two years in federal prison because of a provision in the Patriot Act on the threat of terrorism against mass transportation systems......

....Customs officials say they have used their expanded authority to open at least nine investigations into Latin American officials suspected of laundering money in the United States and to seize millions of dollars from overseas bank accounts in many cases unrelated to terrorism....

....A guide to a Justice Department employee seminar last year on financial crimes, for instance, said: "We all know that the USA Patriot Act provided weapons for the war on terrorism. But do you know how it affects the war on crime as well?"....

Elliot Mincberg, legal director for People for the American Way, a liberal group that has been critical of Ashcroft, said the Justice Department's public assertions struck him as misleading and perhaps dishonest.

"What the Justice Department has really done," he said, "is to get things put into the law that have been on prosecutors' wish lists for years. They've used terrorism as a guise to expand law enforcement powers in areas that are totally unrelated to terrorism."

...The terrorism law has already drawn sharp opposition from those who believe it gives the government too much power to intrude on people's privacy in pursuit of terrorists.

Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said, "Once the American public understands that many of the powers granted to the federal government apply to much more than just terrorism, I think the opposition will gain momentum."....

Excerpt:For instance, the ability to secure nationwide warrants to obtain e-mail and electronic evidence "has proved invaluable in several sensitive nonterrorism investigations," including the tracking of an unidentified fugitive and an investigation into a computer hacker who stole a company's trade secrets, the report said....

.... The authorities have also used toughened penalties under the law to press charges against a lovesick 20-year-old woman from Orange County, Calif., who planted threatening notes aboard a Hawaii-bound cruise ship she was traveling on with her family in May.

The woman, who said she made the threats to try to return home to her boyfriend, was sentenced this week to two years in federal prison because of a provision in the Patriot Act on the threat of terrorism against mass transportation systems......

....Customs officials say they have used their expanded authority to open at least nine investigations into Latin American officials suspected of laundering money in the United States and to seize millions of dollars from overseas bank accounts in many cases unrelated to terrorism....

I suppose in the end, if one does not run afoul of the law in the first place, they need not have this paranoia in their lives.

Tyriffic

I would like to agree with you, but your confidence ignores several things:

* good law enforcement agents and bad law enforcement agents

* guilt by association (ie being subject to investigation because someone remotely connected to you or fraudulently connected to you is investigated)

* being innocent of any wrongdoing but being caught up financially, unwittingly, with any monies which have proceeded out of wrongdoing or which have gone to the wrong party - terrorist or not - can see you having your assets seized

AND the most widespread abuse of the Patriot Act:

* speaking your mind in dissidence will be just cause for having your privacy invaded and your affairs investigated, on no grounds related to terrorism at all.

I hope you don't get caught up in this crap yourself, Tyriffic/macmasterflex.