Senate Passes 4-Year Re-Up of Patriot Act Provisions 422
Bloomberg News reports that, as expected, today "[t]he US Senate approved a four-year extension of provisions in the USA Patriot Act allowing law enforcement to track suspected terrorists with roving wiretaps. ... The measure goes to the House for final passage before being sent to President Barack Obama for his signature. The surveillance powers would be extended until June 1, 2015." The story mentions that the Patriot Act powers this approval includes would extend "to so-called 'lone wolf' suspects who aren't affiliated with any terrorist group."
A valuable lesson to be learned: (Score:1, Interesting)
If you want right wing policies/torture camps to stick around, vote liberal.
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:2, Interesting)
What's the bill number so we can look it up???
Re:it goes beyond mere roving wiretaps (Score:4, Interesting)
It allows Big Brother to collect information on you sans any justification whatsoever
The FBI has been doing this for decades. That notorious threat to public safety, Lucille Ball, had an extensive FBI file.
Re:This is just the tip of the iceberg, John. (Score:5, Interesting)
I disagree, in that I believe firmly that if education were massively improved (and I mean massively), many of the other problems would become obvious to the majority of people as would the solutions. People function with split realities, but not well, and the more extreme the split the greater the discomfort. Deliberately worsen that discomfort through high quality (and maximal quantity) education. These will be the people who do the voting in 20 years time and who will also be the candidates then as well. Superior voters with superior candidates to choose will necessarily improve the situation as a whole.
Those will also be the businesspeople in that timeframe and thus will be making more rational decisions on what jobs are appropriate to be overseas and what jobs are appropriate here.
An informed electorate, or so Plato tells us, will also be less eager to go to war and less eager to blindly follow populist leaders. Indeed, he made it an essential criterion for a functional democracy. The experience of the last decade tells us he was right on the dangers of ignorance, so it seems worth testing whether he was right on the benefits of knowledge and wisdom.
Education alone won't fix all the issues, but I see no reason why - over time - it wouldn't solve a good number. Combine it with quality public healthcare and you solve many of the problems that ill-health cause (weakened economy, reduced opportunity, reduced flexibility, inferior mobility, desires for feel-good politics and/or substance-abuse, etc.)
That last one is worth reflecting on a bit. Religion may be the opiate of the masses, but feel-good politics is crack cocaine. Neither is good for you, both should be avoided where possible, but populist politicians are infinitely more dangerous than populist preachers. Jim Jones killed less than a thousand in total, fanatical politicians in 1914-1918 were managing to average that per day per nation for four years.
Secret Patriot Act (Score:5, Interesting)
You think you understand how the Patriot Act allows the government to spy on its citizens. Sen. Ron Wyden says it’s worse than you know. Congress is set to reauthorize three controversial provisions of the surveillance law as early as Thursday. Wyden (D-Oregon) says that powers they grant the government on their face, the government applies a far broader legal interpretation — an interpretation that the government has conveniently classified, so it cannot be publicly assessed or challenged. But one prominent Patriot-watcher asserts that the secret interpretation empowers the government to deploy ”dragnets” for massive amounts of information on private citizens; the government portrays its data-collection efforts much differently.....
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:5, Interesting)
There are unfortunately only two options in US politics: The Frying pan and the shiny new futuristic looking Frying pan with a non-stick coating
This is not an issue of the two party system, this is an issue of "the public is largely ignorant."
It always annoys me in these discussions when someone suggests the structure of our politics is somehow to blame. That's blaming someone else for our failings, it has nothing to with the number of boxes on a ballot. If more than 50% of the voters wanted the patriot act gone, republicans AND democrats would be slinging mud about "I'd get rid of it a FULL DAY SOONER than my opponent would!" Getting rid of it does -not- require voting in a third party (which, not for nothing, would require us to get rid of the first-past-the-post voting system we have, a move which WOULD require a third party to be voted in).
It's stuck with us because the voters these days are morons who are scared of foreigners with bombs, and are exactly the type of fools who would give up essential liberty for a little bit of security. Politicians are salesmen: they're going to give the customer what they want, not what they need.
We're too gullible when they're campaigning if we seriously believe voting for anyone of any party and then doing nothing else has a good chance of changing anything. Politicians usually don't have the power to lead us very far, politicians can't convince us that the patriot act is an abomination, most of them don't even try. Cable news isn't going to try, terrorism and stoking our fears is too sexy and gets too many viewers to kill that golden goose. To get rid of the PATRIOT act requires those US to inform other voters of what a bad idea it is. Voting for a third party candidate is, in my humble opinion, purely a waste of time if you're just going to check "libertarian" or "green" and do nothing else about it.
That is a tall order. And, full disclosure, I'm busy trying to cure spinal cord injuries and play videogames to campaign against the patriot act. I don't have a problem with apathy, but I do find fault with lying to ourselves that the 2 party system is the problem.
Re:This is just the tip of the iceberg, John. (Score:2, Interesting)
The issues in Texas where they have put creationism in books, a fundamentally specific religious ideology towards christianity.
That's nothing compared to the indoctrinated ideology from the One World Communists that they have been pushing into the curriculum for the last 20 years [newswithviews.com].
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:5, Interesting)
Which is why I advocate doing away with elections altogether and implement Sortition. Essentially. Use the same system we use when selecting juries than when selecting representatives. A representative sample of the population is better than a man at representing the population wouldn't you think?
Yes a Jury will lack experience in technical matters. But so are politicians. Like with politicians and like juries in trials, experts can be provided to inform the jury to take decisions. Unlike politicians, they won't make false promises,
won't take decisions to advance a non existent political careers, nor are they as likely to cheat for personal gain, since they would be different people from different social levels.
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:5, Interesting)
With some research the problems and their solutions can be uncovered. I have determined that the primary cause of the politicians' lack of concern for their constituents is that the voting districts are too huge. House districts were originally supposed to be 30,000 people and not more than 50,000 people. With smaller districts comes greater access to office because the barrier to entry is greatly reduced. No longer are expensive media campaigns and popular personalities the benefit they are when a district is 700,000 people. Another issue resolved is the effectiveness of lobbying. The number of lobbyists required to lobby 10,000 people is so high that it makes it cheaper to just develop superior products than attempt to influence Congress. Unfortunately, every part of the Government and all special interests stand to lose with by returning power to the citizens, so the resources required to fight such a battle are unlikely to present themselves.
Re:This is just the tip of the iceberg, John. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:4, Interesting)
However, they've recognized that the only way to impact politics on a meaningful level is to join the existing two party system.
Am I the only one who noticed that the Tea Party was co-opted and neutralized by the Republican party? It wasn't without huuuuge expenditure of time, effort, and money that the Tea Party was redefined from "radical splinter group in opposition to the Republocrat system" to "militant wing of the Republican party".
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Did your congressman do his duty? (Score:4, Interesting)
I think there are two big flaws in the US system:
1) The assumption that people's wishes and needs line up along geographic boundaries. No matter if it's 2, 30,000 or 700,000 people in a district.
2) First past the pole systems. People can't be divided into two groups. In my country we for example have 9 major political parties with each different combination of the following: [liberal vs. conservative, religious vs. atheist, socialist vs. capitalist, enviromentalist vs. industrialist].
It means that government happens by coalition, which means that the compromises are made between parties, instead of between groups within parties (tea party anyone?). I think it's a more transparent process.
I feel it also gives a lot more power to significant minorities as long as they're willing to compromise.
Next to that it allows for more rejuvenation in the political system, as even a relatively small group can get a foothold and grow from there into replacing established groups.