Homeland Security - Beware

[MTAtech]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Jul20.html

"One provision under the section permits the government to go through your records -- medical records, business records, personnel files, library reading lists "or any tangible thing" (computer hard drives?) -- while bypassing the normal requirements for a criminal search."

[Epidemic]

Great,

If they can do this the implications for criminals would be devastating

[MTAtech]

Why bother having the Bill of Rights then?

Amendment IV

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. "

[MatrixmaN]

That has to defile the constitution somehow...

[Bob The Great]

Ha! I got them there. My Antec case needs a key to get in!

Agent 1: Darn, this man is smart. He left his computer locked.
Agent 2: Quicly we can get a torch to open it!
Agent 1: And ruin the perfectly clear coating that allows us to see our reflections in the side? I think not. No we have been beaten today.

[SeanC]

It's sad that the US government is using peoples fear of terrorist attacks against them by stomping all over their rights and liberties that are afforded them in the Constitution.

Sean

[Knothead]

Originally posted by SeanC
It's sad that the US government is using peoples fear of terrorist attacks against them by stomping all over their rights and liberties that are afforded them in the Constitution.

Sean

I totally agree. The Founding Fathers of our country must be spinning in their graves.

GWB swore to uphold the Constitution. Grrrr.

[Siliconjunkie]

<begin personal view that may differ from yours>
Personally, I really don't care if they want to look. We had quite a discussion at work one night about things like this and it amazes me that people think that the govt. actually a)cares what they say/do day to day b)has the resources to just dig around at random to see what they can find.

Kinda along the same lines of people that are worried that AOL/Yahoo/MSN is logging all of their IM conversations or e-mail. Trust me, 99% of us aren't that interesting. And the storage/resources to do this would be astronomical.

All of that aside, it's not like the gov couldn't/didn't do things like this before. If they want to know something about someone they simply go look it up/subpeona it. It's not like they pull a name out of a hat and go see what they can find. Something leads them to that name.
<end personal view that may differ from yours>

The big problem with a ton of policy and procedure is that they can jepordize an investigation. And, sometimes speed is important. At some point we have to put at least some amount of faith in them.

And for the IV Ammendment, "unreasonable" is the key word there. Who defines it? Certainly not the people. Most would take the opportunity to say ANY is unreasonable. It is left to the courts to interpet if this is unreasonable or not.

[MTAtech]

GWB swore to uphold the Constitution.

"I George Bush do solemnly swear to uphold the constitution of the United States of America."

That's 16 words! We already learned that he doesn't think he needs to tell the truth if its only 16 words.

[MatrixmaN]

Technically he shouldn't have been allowed to put that in the security act right?

I mean somebody simply overlooked it.....because it's illegal to even suggest, let alone uphold it......as we all know the government isn't aloud to do illegal things.....it's hypocritical.