Politics: A new beginning

[Watchtower]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
he was saying he fears the craftsman holding the tool, not the tool so much, I think.
I am starting to believe it is simply this fear, justified or no, which is the basis for the erosion talk.
NB in 1.5 hrs. Atticus will log on and remind us of the Afghan tribesman who insulted someones daughter, and ended up at Gitmo for a few years. I am not dismissing these issues, I'm simply trying to issue spot at this point.

I am simply saying that I thought this thread was in response to a question asked about Ashcroft and the extent to which he is responsible for limiting peoples civil rights. Or perhaps Ashcroft was meant to mean the Bush Administration?

The PA is a bill Ashcroft backed, but it obviously took a couple hundred Congressmen to pass it. My responses have simply been highlighting some recent restrictions on civil rights that have come to my attention. If you are simply trying to catalog, I was giving examples and a catalog would be much longer. For example, it would include the actions of the Fed and the FDIC in increasing scrutiny of bank records. Whether you know it or not, your local bank is likely to report any bounced check to the Fed as a suspicious activity if you are Arab American, and has been encouraged to do so by the regulatory agencies. The list is likely to go on and on, but I have not seen anyone attempt to compile a complete list. Perhaps Ty, who is more well-read than I, can help us here.

I really liked that article RT found. So, Mr. Chianski, the list that doesn't exist happens to be 88 pages long?

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Burger, you're rational, so I'm glad you said this. I can't get anyone who says "rights erosion" to tell me what rights have eroded, beyond suspected terrorists who were grabbed and held incommunicado, or the guys at Gitmo. Put aside these guys, and not asking you to agree these actions are right, what other rights have eroded? I understand the slippery slope argument of grabbing guys who appear to have some tie, and how it could get to looser ties. Anything else? Honest question, please answer.

I'd think the answer is that general privacy rights (if you believe in such things) have been greatly eroded by the authority granted the government under the Patriot Act and/or other post-9/11 legislation and its implementation.

As two concrete for instances --

(1) Consider the requirement that libraries can be compelled to report folks who check out certain books and/or compelled to give up the reading records of specific individuals on request from the government.

(Yes, in the past few months Ashcroft made a big deal of noting publicly that the DOJ had not used that power yet. Doesn't make me feel much better.)

(2) An article in the WaPo over the weekend noted that the government was preparing to implement a requirement, over the objections of airlines and "privacy groups" that the air travel record of any individual must be made available to the governent on request. The premise is that it will help them evaluate terrorist risks.

S_A_M

[edited: typos]

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Scroll then post

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
Even Hilary Clinton laughs at this assertion. "Stark erosion"? What's changed? Has anyone looked to see what library books you've checked out? Have any of the major precepts of the Patriot Act been used, anywhere? This trikes me as the most overblown, least supported hysteria in history. (Not your statement - I mean the huge outcry over a non-existent change.)

Maybe they haven't been used yet Bilmore - but they _could_ be used now that they exist. The premise in my view is not that the government is actually peering everywhere -- but now could legally do so.

Thus to the extent that we ever had a privacy right in our reading habits, or travel, etc. -- that right is gone or "eroded".

It surprises me that someone who remembers the Nixon adminsitration would be so untroubled, and would assume that the government would just never do anything _wrong_ with its shiny new legal powers.

(I also say that, if they don't do anything wrong, it will be in part because of th huge outcry that you decry. Such pressure also has useful moderaing effects.)

S_A_M

[Tyrone Slothrop]

S_A_M and Burger and I agree on almost everything, but I say it angry-like.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Stuff

Keep reading.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
S_A_M and Burger and I agree on almost everything, but I say it angry-like.

But you're a tax-and-spend liberal. I mean, a fucking tax-and-spend liberal asshole.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
S_A_M and Burger and I agree on almost everything, but I say it angry-like.

Apropos of nothing, I was listening to a comedian yesterday who points out that the new "crushing of liberties" arguments are really devoid of factual support, but are full of fears of facts that could appear, and so are properly termed "factesque."

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
But you're a tax-and-spend liberal. I mean, a fucking tax-and-spend liberal asshole.

No, that's Bush.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Isn't that reductio ad absurdum* *shit, I hope I have that right, what with your classics training and all. ?

I think you have the meaning basically right ("your argument has been pursued to it's logical end and has been demonstrated to be absurd" - basically "slippery slope" outside of a strict logic problem), but I don't think it works here.

I mean, you can argue nothing you do outside of your house is a civil right, so it's perfectly okay to ban such activities on whatever basis one sees fit.

Er, one doesn't follow from the other. You don't need to assert "it's a civil right" to say that gov't can't ban it. I'm Ms. Libertarian and a big proponent of the 10th Amendment, myself, so as a general rule I don't think the gov't should be allowed to do jack shit. But it doesn't mean I think everything is a "civil right." I generally think that "civil rights" are the basic rights attaching to citizenship (and therefore are mainly rights with respect to governmental & political participation and benefits): right to vote, right to engage in civil society on an equal footing with one's fellow citizens, right to equal standing before the law. I don't think the "right to fly on commercial airlines" quite rises to that level, though freedom of movement generally probably does (as would freedom of association, free speech rights, etc.).

Note - I'm not standing for the proposition that the gov can impose limitations and restrictions on citizens based on race (which hasn't been asserted yet - no one knows what the proposed restriction parameters are, though I'd wager that national origin will be a biggie), or based on anything else for that matter just because I don't think they violate civil rights. My point is that "civil rights" aren't the only freedoms protected from gov't intrusion. So (to draw an example from my turf) one doesn't need to show that having bad taste in prints is a civil right to say that the gov't can't lock you up for your fashion crimes or ban you from wearing that Hawaiian shirt ever again.

edited because my grammar not too good today

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by bilmore
No, that's Bush.

Then what does that make Kerry?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by bilmore
Apropos of nothing, I was listening to a comedian yesterday who points out that the new "crushing of liberties" arguments are really devoid of factual support, but are full of fears of facts that could appear, and so are properly termed "factesque."

Did you get the talking Ann Coulter action figure for Christmas too? Cool.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
But the point is, they're doing things they could have done before using existing statutes, and merely listing the PA sections as the relevent authority on the warrants. No substantive difference - just an easier, all-inclusive label and statutory citer for cops to remember.

Someone said this, fine, but I'd really like a citation for the premise that all of the Patriot Act powers were in existence before, especially on the library book and airline records issue -- _especially_ for their use as preemptive/prevention measures rather than as part of the investigation of crimes already committed.

(I think that is the big differerence, and what makes them more subject to abuse. If this makes me a partisan idiot, then so be it.)

S_A_M

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Then what does that make Kerry?

A French-looking, haughty rich bastard who, by the way, served in Viet Nam?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
I think you have the meaning basically right

I was worried about whether I got the declensions right.

Er, one doesn't follow from the other. You don't need to assert "it's a civil right" to say that gov't can't ban it.

you're confusing rights. or they are in the original quote (which I'm not going to scroll back to post). The civil right at issue is participating equally with other citizens in pursuing the liberties we have in our (supposedly) free country. It's a freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, not the freedom to fly, that's at issue. Query whether the searches are unreasonable, but that's a separate issue.