fewer rights was:Re: As war with Iraq seems to be more on the agenda

From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Tue Aug 06 2002 - 22:17:11 MDT


Brian D Williams wrote:

>>From: Samantha Atkins <samantha@objectent.com>
>>
>
>>I don't care how many "wars" we lose. Bush and company must go.
>> It is not a matter of "dislike". It is a matter of the
>>greatest threat to American freedom and well-being that has been
>>called "President". Do you actually like this man who threatens
>>so much I thought you believed in?
>>
>
> Gee, that's odd. I haven't lost any freedoms and ones that had been
> infringed under the previous administration have been partially
> restored...
>
>

What is odd is that you and many others seem to be taking a very
subjectivist view of whether you feel deprived of any rights.
Lets look at it from the document that, in America, guarantees
and delienates at least some of our rights, the Constitution and
see where we stand.

Many seem to have missed that under current legislation you can
be detained indefinitely and deprived of counsel without being
charged and then tried by a secret tribunal. (bad news for 5th
amendment and for Article 1, Section 9 especially habeus corpus)

You can have all of your assets frozen without due process or
even knowing the charges against you. (blow against 5th
ammendment, 4th amendment Article 3, Section 2)

You can be put under survelliance at the whim of any field
operative. They can come into your house secretly and take
whatever they wish. They can surreptitiously implant devices and
software on your computers to record every keystroke. All data
about you and all your activities can be cross-referenced and
disseminated to any all interested parties with very little
control. This could happen if you get branded a terrorist
which, under the definitions of the PATRIOT act and subsequent
rumblings implying everyting with a computer the authorities (or
Hollywood) don't like is "cyber-terrorism", is unfortunately all
too possible for any of us.

I guess your 4th amendment rights don't matter much to you.

If you should get branded a cyber-terrorist, for, say,

claiming fair-use to bypass broken copy protection to run the
CD you paid for on your computer or copy tracks to your MP3
player (a felony under many current and proposed laws), then you
can be hit with multiple counts of 5-10 year sentences and
$50,000+ fines. But I reckon that the 8th Amendment is not one
you care for either.

I also suppose that the you don't mind having a president chosen
by some method other than that mandated by the Constitution and
this one was.

Long before this president, and especially with the "War on
Drugs", citizens are subject to having their property seized by
the states before any crime was committed. Oops, there goes the
14th Amendment, Section 1.

These are just a few off the top of my head. I hope this is
taken to heart as showing the situation is realistically
dangerous and should be attended to closely. I hope to hell
enough of us do take it very seriously before it is too late.

- samantha



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