Slow Murder of the Fourth Amendment

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S

Fri, 17 Feb 2006 16:45:51 -0800 (PST)

Slow Murder of the Fourth Amendment

 

 

 

http://kurtnimmo.com/?p=229

 

Slow Murder of the Fourth Amendment

Friday February 17th 2006, 4:26 pm

 

 

Earlier today, I called Jack Blood's radio show on GCN and complained

loudly and mightily about how the PATRIOT Act was rubber stamped by

the Senate yesterday, paving the way for all manner of continued and

increasing malfeasance against the people and the now jackboot

trampled and seriously bruised (if not comatose) Bill of Rights.

 

" The Senate voted 96-3 to move toward final passage of new civil

liberties protections to the Patriot Act, which the White House

negotiated with a handful of Republicans, " reports Knight Ridder.

" Some Democrats remain convinced that the post-Sept. 11, 2001,

anti-terrorism law gives the federal government too much power to

intrude into the lives of innocent Americans. It is set to expire next

month unless it is renewed. "

 

Of course, these are the same Democrats who apparently don't have a

problem with the NSA snooping in on your phone calls and email, almost

effortlessly crumbling under " heavy pressure " from the Straussian

neocons, according to ranking Senate Intelligence Committee Democrat

Jay Rockefeller (the name alone should provide a clue why he has

acquiesced).

 

Instead of protecting the people of the United States from the

heavy-handed and authoritarian tactics of the neocons, Pat Roberts has

suggested the 1978 FISA law governing electronic " eavesdropping "

(basically underwear drawer snooping) be modified to allow " extensive

briefings on the closely guarded National Security Agency program, " in

other words a select few enemies of the people will be included in the

loop.

 

NSA snooping is nothing new—it has simply taken on a new urgency under

the Bushian neocons as they inexorably wend their demented way toward

total war and, in the process, strive to silence (if not eliminate)

their growing number of critics. General Michael Hayden—the guy who

believes the Fourth Amendment contains no requirement for probable

cause—made sure to tell us the NSA is operating under Executive Order

12333, signed by Reagan in 1981.

 

EO 12333 was created to allow the FBI to use intrusive " investigatory "

techniques, such as mail openings, wiretaps and burglaries, when there

was supposedly probable cause to suspect a " terrorist " threat.

" Executive Order 12333, permits the FBI and CIA to surveil individuals

even if they are not breaking the law or acting on behalf of a foreign

power, " explains Margaret Ratner of the Center for Constitutional

Rights. " Searches need not be limited to offices, or to premises under

the control of a suspected agent, nor need they be linked to the

alleged commission of an unlawful act. " In short, so-called searches

can be conducted in massive, sweeping, and indiscriminate fashion.

" Ratner noted with irony that the FBI's remarkable claim of this

unconstitutional inherent authority came after the secret Foreign

Intelligence Surveillance Court `turned down an FBI request for a

warrant to conduct a black bag job, holding that Congress had given it

jurisdiction only over electronic surveillance,' " according to

PublicEye (see previous link). FISA was chucked as useless more than

two decades ago.

 

In other words, we have lived under the eye of a fascist and

technocratic Panopticon for some time now and the NSA " scandal " is

nothing new—instead, under the direction of the Machiavellian neocons,

untethered and muscular surveillance has reached a quite natural and

logical (under the authoritarian rubric) height. If the technology now

currently employed existed in the 1930s, no doubt the Nazis (and

Stalin) would have used it in similar fashion.

 

As the history of COINTELPRO reveals, the idea here is not to monitor

Osama's phone calls placed from an Afghan cave, but instead

investigating and disrupting dissident political organizations and

individuals (and thus violating the Constitution and the Bill of

Rights). First and foremost, the NSA snoop program (and parallel

efforts such as CIFA at the Pentagon) is all about psychological

warfare, harassment, intimidation, infiltration, black bag jobs, and

even so-called extralegal force and violence. COINTELPRO, however, was

illegal—but under the newly enshrined PATRIOT, the COINTELPROesque

efforts of the Straussian neocons are entirely legal—and will be put

to good use.

 

In the months ahead—as the Straussian neocons shock and awe Iran and

other selected enemies—no doubt we will find out how effective massive

snooping (and psywar unbound) is against those of us who speak and act

out.