The Patriot Act(s) - Tempest In A Teapot Or Handbasket To Hell?

Fred Herman

"A casual scrutiny of history reveals that we humans have a sad tendency to make the same mistakes again and again. Power tends to corrupt us. We're afraid of strangers or anybody a little different from us. When we get scared, we start pushing people around. We have readily accessible buttons that release powerful emotions when pressed. We can be manipulated into senselessness by clever politicians. Give us the right kind of leader and we gladly do anything he wants - even things we know to be wrong." Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan, Parade Magazine, 9/8/91, "Real Patriots ask Questions."

"We are only one (act of) terrorism away," warned a lawyer in a recent TV courtroom drama, "from kissing the Constitution goodbye."

Well --- maybe I set a tough goal for my 15th annual Modesto farewell sermon: To convince this fellowship, 40 percent of which could not endorse joining other faiths in opposing war, that the sky is indeed falling. In the cliché correspondence from hell, my sibling cites Chicken Little. Your rights are untouched, she insists. You had no problems, she pontificates.

Those "Patriot" laws cannot hold up, she says. In a Rehnquist, Scalia and Thomas court, I ask, aghast. It won't get that far, she vows. Any appeals court would kill it. That, folks, is what they call whistling in the cemetery.

First a little history.

The 1920s Harding regime gave us Teapot Dome, an attempt to steal U.S. oil reserves. For pure evil, try Nixon and Watergate; nothing ever surprised Nixon watchers. For ideological demagoguery to make official lying an art form, see Reagan's Iran/Contra scandals.

Roll all three into one governmental nightmare and you still lack the over-all ugliness of Bush Two.

Dubya lost by a half million votes and in the electoral college but for brother Jeb's vote fraud. He was crowned by five judicial politicians who ignored their oaths. He ran on compassionate conservatism, but shows no compassion. He privatized public property, ruined air, water, forests, never met a developer whose money he didn't like, cut taxes for the rich, stole from the poor and shamed our nation forever in the eyes of the world.

"The lunatics are now in charge of the asylum," said the normally staid Financial Times, traditional voice of solid British business opinion.

On Sept, 11, 2001, 19 Moslems who died became the best friends a Bush ever had. Suddenly we were unified - with Bush, against those who name their deity Allah. First we invaded Afghanistan. Then, with no link to 9/11, we went for the Iraqi oil. Those weapons of mass destruction were a hoax. Not a slingshot was found!

So was saving Pvt. Jessica Lynch. That Pentagon script made the "Wag The Dog" film look tame, Robert Scheer wrote in May. He said the BBC found "one of the most stunning bits of news management ever conceived," a polite way to say "liar, liar, pants on fire." In reply, Fox News talk terrorist Bill O'Reilly branded Scheer a traitor.

Even Nixon counsel John Dean sees enough lies to impeach George Dubya, but the 9/11 fallout continues - commencement speakers booed off college platforms, commercial sponsors blacklisting entertainers from Martin Sheen to Danny Glover to the Dixie Chicks.

The Nation quotes historian Henry Foner: "The fear in this country since 9/11 is probably more intense than the fear of communism in the '50s." The Nation says Ashcroft treats the Constitution as a threat to America. Six weeks later, without real debate, Congress passed an acronym for "Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism," surely so titled to imply that anyone who opposes it is unpatriotic and ignore its threats to the constitution's first, fourth, fifth, sixth, eighth, and 14th amendments.

With no warrants or probable cause, the FBI may now access your health, credit, library and school records - and not allow anyone to tell you about it.

The Justice Department wants a sequel, a Domestic Security Enhancement Act to leave us indistinguishable from any tyranny we prop up anywhere. Details so far have only been leaked, at great risk to the leaker. Even such right-wingers as The American Conservative Union, Gun Owners of America and Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum protest. Guess who wrote this quote:

"Once we've handed over the immense power these surveillance regimes demand -- once we've untethered the corrupting influence such power invariably exerts on its bearers -- how, exactly, do we get our freedoms back?

"The technology may be new, but its misuses are as old as hatred or greed. We all know from the Hitlers, Stalins and Maos of history exactly where this can lead. But where does it all end? When we're all strip-searched, DNA- scanned, followed, filmed, tracked and profiled from cradle to grave? What are the consequences for freedom when the state can concentrate such power, and such power can be so easily misused?"

Do I hear Charlton Heston, as NRA president?

But the fight is led by the American Civil Liberties Union, which in 1922 Tennessee won the right to teach evolution. The ACLU wants constitutional safeguards with its security.

In May nine Modesto UUs attended an organizational meeting 70 at a Stockton church. Three ACLU staffers spoke, including Sanjeev Bery, who reviewed video games for the Bee a few short years ago and would love to push a Modesto chapter. Unfortunately he is with Auburn UUs even as we speak here, but he'll be in Modesto next Sunday in a gathering I'll discuss further in a moment.

Tommie Muhammad of Modesto's King Kennedy Center attended as a Stocktonian and pledged Modesto facilities. Scare stories abounded in Stockton - and remember that much of what has come out has been only by leaks. Accountability falls when secrecy rises.

PA2 would let Ashcroft prosecute you for donating to a Mid-Eastern orphanage or to Greenpeace, strip you of citizenship for doing so and deport you ... somewhere...

• Federal officials perpetrating unconstitutional acts are shielded if acting on behalf of higher-ups.
• Thousands of jailed illegal aliens are presumed guilty, treated as criminals until they prove otherwise.
• Fifteen new categories for capital crimes are created.
• Public libraries must tell who borrows what, and it's a crime to tell patrons their reading habits are open.
• Judges routinely approve wiretaps without knowing whose phones are bugged.

The respected Washington Spectator newsletter adds that PA2 would let companies hide health and safety data by giving it to the Department of Homeland Security. This would keep chemical or nuclear leaks secret, stop citizen lawsuits in case of "accident" and allow criminal prosecution of any employee who blows a whistle.

And there were reports on abuses already committed:

• "No-fly" lists, people peremptorily bumped from commercial aircraft as "security risks." Maybe you once signed a petition; no one need explain the grounding.
• Booksellers are asked to report who bought - for instance - "The Hunt For Red October."
• A man who refused to take off a "peace on earth" tee shirt is arrested in an upstate New York mall.
• Forty-one of 56 accused "terrorists" had no ties to terrorism but went bankrupt in their own defense.
• A Stocktonian reported asking Rep. Richard Pombo about the act and receiving a reply from ... the FBI.

Idiocy begets idiocy as state governments join in. Don't sneeze on a wheat stalk in Topeka. Exposing a crop to infectious disease may soon spell terrorism in Kansas.

A Pennsylvania legislator would define "environmental terrorism" as a threat to commit "a crime of violence ... destructive to property or business."

In Oklahoma "terrorism" could be "any conduct calculated to damage or destroy property or produce a state of adversity, anxiety or fear...to coerce the granting of demands, altering rights or effecting any industrial, political or economic ends." Asked if "any conduct" was too broad, a sponsor said, "I favor demonstrations so long as they are peaceful. That's what Hitler did."

Some proposals make sense, editorializes The Nation, journalism's No. 1 guardian of free speech: protecting public buildings, tightening nuclear plant security, updating emergency response systems. Others are more hazardous. Hence the sermon title, "Handbasket to Hell."

Since 9/11, the number of Americans who believe the First Amendment goes too far is up 10 percent, but ACLU membership has risen even faster, by 100,000 nationally.

An ACLU newsletter reports Vermont, Alaska, Hawaii and 115 cities and counties opposing these acts. Not just the usual college hotbeds - Cambridge, Madison, Eugene, Ann Arbor, Boulder, Arcata, Tucson, Berkeley and Santa Cruz - but Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia and Baltimore. More than 15 million people are represented. Alaska bars racial profiling or using state resources in federal immigration matters. State agencies may not compile intelligence dossiers on political, religious and social views of individuals and groups, unless these relate directly to a criminal investigation.

Green-dominated Arcata of Humboldt State University and Bayside UU fellowship goes a step farther. A new city ordinance fines $57 any city department head who voluntarily complies with investigations or arrests.

"We shouldn't stand by silently as rights are eroded," Eugene council member Bonny Bettman said. "Our rights and freedoms help distinguish us from our enemies."

When Philadelpha acted, "the liberty bell rang again," director Laura W. Murphy of the ACLU Washington office said. "The cradle of our democracy again said Americans will not let precious freedoms be sacrificed in the name of stopgap security measures that fail to make us safer."

Portland, Ore., police broke ranks with the feds early, vowing not to cooperate with FBI investigations of Middle Eastern students; Oregon law bans police questioning of immigrants not suspected of crimes.

Broward Co., Fla., site of a key Bush election fraud, was 100th to turn itself into a civil liberties free zone.

This spring the California League of Women Voters unanimously passed a resolution urging immediate national opposition to these acts.

Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold, only US senator to oppose Patriot 1, explained: "Preserving freedom is why we engage in this war on terrorism. We will lose that war without a shot if we sacrifice the liberties of Americans."

Independent Vermont Rep. Bernie Sanders vows to push exempting libraries and booksellers from curbs on constitutional rights and strengthen congressional oversight to ensure readers freedom from government surveillance of their lives and reading habits.

The American Library Association tells members that most state laws already on the books permit release of confidential library records if the library is served with a court order that shows cause - but admonishes members to seek legal counsel if served.

Even Republican House Judiciary Committee chair James Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin wails that the Justice Department doesn't let lawmakers judge this act:

"The department has classified as top-secret most of what it's doing," he told an Associated Press interviewer.

Bill Moyers reported that that committee asked the FBI how it has used the new powers that had been given to it under the Patriot Act. And the Justice Department said, "We can't tell you that information, it's classified."

Moyers asked Chuck Lewis, director of the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity, if he sees any protection against abuse: "I don't think there's much - there's a lot more authority and power for government. There's less oversight and information about what government is doing. The safeguards seem pretty minimal to me.

"We have a history," he added. "We've seen FBI and CIA abuse ordinary citizens. Mail has been opened, homes broken into. Infiltration has occurred in political groups. Informants have been used, misused. People's lives have been ruined. People have committed suicide."

Lewis finds PA2 ten times as bad as PA1. Don't like that? Too bad. A Findlaw article warns you not to make a federal case of it - "we'll bar the courthouse door."

You learn you're spied on illegally? Too bad. Patriot II immunizes law enforcement against liability for spying. Unauthorized federal searches and surveillances relating to foreign intelligence are legal if "pursuant to a lawful authorization from the president or attorney general."

A business rival calls you a "suspected terrorist"? Forget it. Don't even think lawsuit. Patriot II eliminates civil liability for "suspected terrorist" tips no matter how malicious or unfounded.

Village Voice columnist Nat Hentoff quoted Democratic senator Pat Leahy of Vermont of the Senate Judiciary Committee: "The early signals from the administration about its intentions for this bill are ominous..."

Where, asked Hentoff, is the debate - in Congress or the media? After a few initial press stories about Act II, there has been little follow-up.

The Washington Post says the Justice Department uses anti-terror powers against unrelated crimes like drugs, credit card fraud and bank theft.

ACLU legislative counsel Tim Edgar fears abuse of these new powers. "Many of these terrorism powers were actually being asked for as a way of increasing the government's authority in other areas," Edgar said.

Southeastern Legal Foundation President Phil Kent refers to the initiative as "the most sweeping threat to civil liberties since Japanese-American internment."

There is hope. Three Democrats have introduced a Surveillance Oversight and Disclosure Act in the House.

Why the rant on a Sunday morning, in a Unitarian- Universalist setting? Director Rob Cavenaugh of the UUA Washington Office for Advocacy has given this his prime attention:

"I favor a coalition effort rather than an individual UU one." he wrote me. "The 2001 GA picked civil liberties as the study action issue for 2002-2004." GA delegates Mary Lee and Mari Martelli will tell us next Sunday what UUs did with that in Boston last month. Meanwhile it's a key theme in our churches all year.

Rob's interfaith statement on a religious response is signed not only by the UUA but Disciples of Christ, Baptists, Quakers, Methodists, Lutherans, Mennonites, Presbyterians, Church Women United and many others.

It says, in part: "Free and open discussion is essential if people of faith are to address challenges to our nation and world. In such discussions, respect for persons who hold differing views is essential. Rather than question the loyalty of those with whom we disagree, we ought to recognize that true patriotism requires expression that is critical of injustice and misguided governmental policy, as well as showing support for the values, policies and practices that are just and good.

"Persons must be free to hold religious belief or unbelief without coercion, meet for public worship and witness, speak prophetically from religious conviction to government and society, live out religious beliefs, and be free from government intrusion, coercion, and control of the free exercise of conscience and religion.

"September 11th had a chilling effect on the religious expression of certain faith groups, particularly Muslims.

"We are concerned that ethnic, national, and religious profiling by law enforcement only reinforces this fear, and fosters an environment in which individuals regularly feel unable or that it is unwise to exercise their right to religious expression. We are very concerned that the Department of Justice has relaxed surveillance restrictions on domestic religious organizations.

"As communities of faith, we are concerned that changes in federal law and policy are causing innocent people to suffer needlessly. We believe that the efforts of our nation to confront and counter terrorism should be conducted with the least restrictive means necessary, as determined through open debate and deliberation.

"In our efforts to protect the freedom of our country against aggression from without, we must be vigilant against the suppression of freedom from within the United States itself. In providing a defense against possible attacks on the liberty of our people, we ought not adopt methods by which we compromise the very liberty we seek to defend."

What's next? Who knows? Stay tuned. See Connections, maybe the Bee, make that first ACLU session at 3 p.m. next Sunday in the King Kennedy Community Center. Get your name on the list to be notified. Give generously.

Let your lawmaker know you oppose limiting rights in the name of any "war on terrorism." Remember that our Rep. Dennis Cardoza wasn't around to vote on Patriot 1.

Many e-mails these days end by quoting Ben Franklin: Those who'd swap freedom for security deserve neither.

[Delivered 17 August 2003. Fred Herman is a member of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Stanislaus County.]

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