Secret Court Ok's Wiretapping Powers

[PornoDoggy]

Yes ... the Democrats did try to strip some provisions attached at the 11th hour to the Homeland Security Bill. You will be glad to know that Eli Lili will be safe from the terrorist parents of autistic children possibly born that way due to a defective drug, and of course their trial lawyer lackeys. The "protect the vaccine makers" defense is a pretty lame wrapping for a very nice political payoff. I know that I will sleep better knowing that a research center for Homeland Security will be in Texas. I'm eternally grateful to the Republicans for ensuring that companies so American they have seen fit to move off-shore will be allowed a piece of the Homeland Security hog.

And JR, my man, you read any recent American history? It wasn't very long ago that the FBI compiled a file on anyone they considered suspicious. They developed their suspicions by such means as copying "peace" petitions and adding the names of everyone who signed them. They took photos of people who participated in civil rights and anti-war demonstrations and added them to the files. They tracked people into the 70s because they had belonged to an organization, often as teenagers, in the 1940s or 50s considered a Communist front. And if that's not enough, consider the anti-civil rights committees and commissions that several states maintained, and the damage they did to people.

Now, you have an attorney general that describes those who criticize his actions as "aiding the terrorists." Maybe you don't see the concern - this is America, you have that right. I guess this is where the real conservatives will separate from the reactionaries and Republican apologists. A whole lot of people do see dangerous precedent here; not all of them are on the left, and very few of them are as "whacked out" as you like to portray.

And yes, I've read your post about the fact that much of the Patriot Act legislation was a Clinton proposal. So what? Do you think for one minute that I would have found this crap any more acceptable had it passed then? Granted, I don't recall Janet Reno proclaiming that those who objected to her policies as "enemies of freedom", but you really underestimate most people who fear this legislation. Democrats and liberals are far more likely to dislike things on principle, rather than on party lines. We would have screamed loud as hell then, too. Problem is, no one would have heard us over the din of Trent Lott, etc., screaming about Big Government.



Last edited by PornoDoggy at Nov 19 2002, 04:36 PM