Terror Alert

This article from the Washington Post, The FBI's Secret Scrutiny, should send shivers up everyone's spine. This is the real terror alert, not the fake Orange, Red, or Rainbow colored pre-election terror warnings that come our way to head off bad news or slumping poll results.

According to the article, "The FBI now issues more than 30,000 national security letters a year . . . a hundredfold increase over historic norms. The letters -- one of which can be used to sweep up the records of many people -- are extending the bureau's reach as never before into the telephone calls, correspondence and financial lives of ordinary Americans."

"Issued by FBI field supervisors, national security letters do not need the imprimatur of a prosecutor, grand jury or judge. They receive no review after the fact by the Justice Department or Congress. The executive branch maintains only statistics, which are incomplete and confined to classified reports. The Bush administration defeated legislation and a lawsuit to require a public accounting, and has offered no example in which the use of a national security letter helped disrupt a terrorist plot."

"The burgeoning use of national security letters coincides with an unannounced decision to deposit all the information they yield into government data banks -- and to share those private records widely, in the federal government and beyond. In late 2003, the Bush administration reversed a long-standing policy requiring agents to destroy their files on innocent American citizens, companies and residents when investigations closed. Late last month, President Bush signed Executive Order 13388, expanding access to those files for 'state, local and tribal" governments and for "appropriate private sector entities,' which are not defined."

The concept of this Act is anathema to what this country is supposed to stand for, yet it's called the "Patriot Act." This is the USA we are referring to, not Russia. The agency is the FBI, not the KGB. You have to be reminded of that, because otherwise it is hard to tell.

This piece regarding the Patriot Act and the expanded powers of the FBI makes Big Brother look like Little Women. It's a must read. And once you read it, you will want to take to the streets in protest until the non-Patriot Act is repealed.