Alternate title: They can’t “hate our freedom” if we get rid of it; that’ll show ‘em!
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation on Wednesday to renew the USA Patriot Act, setting up a showdown with the Senate over a centerpiece of President George W. Bush’s war on terrorism.
On a 251-174 vote, the House approved the measure, with supporters saying it would properly balance civil liberties with the need to bolster national security.
But a number of Democrats and Republicans vowed to oppose the legislation in the Senate, which is expected to take up the bill in coming days. They charged that despite increased congressional and judicial oversight, it would still give the government too much power to pry into the lives of Americans, including their medical, gun and library records.
It’s funny how I remember so many people saying (in response to my previous criticism of this act) that the government will roll back those changes to civil liberties, and that they’re only necessary in a time of war, etc. etc. They said that the beauty of this act was that it had expiration dates, so that the infringements could not be made permanent; yet now they seek to do so. Basing the need for such laws on whether we’re in a “time of war” or not is a misleading tactic, because there are so many wars that can never be completely won (”war on terror”, “war on drugs”, etc.) for us to be perpetually involved in.
In addition, where is the evidence that indicates that these new laws have done anything to prevent terrorism? This is another one of those double sided arguments that proponents of these tactics love to take: if there are no major terror attacks, then the laws were effective, but if there were attacks, we must need even stronger laws to prevent them in the future.
“Defending America” should not involve going against the fundamental principles of our constitution in the process. When you look at the growing list of things we used to characterize “bad guy” governments as doing (imprisoning people without charge or trial or even opportunity to tell their families what has happened to them, then taking them to secret detention facilities which sometimes involve the use of torture, and the laundry list of other civil rights violations), you have to ask yourself how many of those tactics we’re willing to take on ourselves in the process; and whether, in doing so, we undermine the point or principle of “defending” the country that we value.