Illustration by JARRETT QUON/Daily Bruin Click here for
Ben Shapiro’s opposing column
Big Brother peers through eyes of Anti-Terrorism
Bill
DEBATE: Act allows search of suspected terrorists
without “˜good cause,’ regard for rights
 Mitra Ebadolahi Ebadolahi is a
fourth-year international development studies and history student
who believes that the forces of good will kiss evil on the lips.
She encourages comments at [email protected].
Click Here for more articles by Mitra Ebadolahi
Public notice to all in favor of free speech, free association,
due process and citizen privacy: get out now. America is no place
for you.
Beg to differ? Read the text of the so-called Anti-Terrorism
Bill and get back to me.
The Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate
Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT)
Act is the newest law in the land. More than just a ridiculous
acronym, this bill destroys many of the most basic freedoms of
which Americans are so proud.
Formulated by a handful of senators a mere two weeks before it
was ratified, the PATRIOT Act was rushed through Congress with
minimal debate.
Even more troubling is the fact that the bill was passed before
most senators had the chance to read it in its entirety. Who needs
meticulous legislators when you can just have a room full of human
rubber stamps?
So what exactly has Congress authorized our government to do?
Brace yourselves, people ““ this ain’t pretty.
According to the USA PATRIOT Act, we are all potential
terrorists. As a result, various federal agencies ““ ncluding
the CIA and FBI ““ are now allowed to conduct secret searches,
tap private e-mails and phone calls, designate domestic groups as
terrorist organizations, search personal financial records, and
detain and incarcerate permanent residents and non-citizens
indefinitely.
And the fine print just makes things worse.
The PATRIOT Act supersedes previous legislation that protected
the privacy of every student in the United States. The Feds have
already begun to track students with “Middle Eastern”
names. Now they can expand their searches to any students involved
in activist organizations working to change the status quo.
With this bill, guilt by association ““ the hallmark of the
Red Scare era ““ has been reintroduced into our society.
Groups as diverse as the Gun Club and the Anti-War Coalition will
be vulnerable to wiretaps and tracing, simply because their student
members have chosen to stand up for something in which they
believe.
Lacking “good cause” requirements and protective
judicial review processes, the bill leaves students open to racial
profiling and other forms of discriminatory harassment at the hands
of Big Brother.
The bill also expands federal authority to wiretap phone
conversations and e-mail correspondence. Rather than tapping a
specific phone or computer, the act allows officials to tap
particular people and the multiple communication devices that
“terrorists” may use. Such roving wiretaps authorize
the Feds to monitor anyone using a public phone or computer
terminal, and absolve officials from having to prove a legitimate
reason for surveillance.
Think that our government can be trusted not to abuse these
sweeping new authorities? I wouldn’t be so sure. The FBI and
CIA have conspired against the American people for decades; the new
measures included in the PATRIOT Act make abuses of power all the
more likely.
The so-called Anti-Terrorism Bill also allows officials to
detain indefinitely immigrants and other non-citizens ““
including permanent residents ““ on the mere suspicion of
terrorist activity. The government is no longer required to give
detainees hearings or fair trials, or to prove that those
incarcerated are actually terrorists.
Proof beyond reasonable doubt or based on substantial evidence,
two mainstays of the American justice system, are no longer
necessary. Soon we will need a domestic Operation Enduring Freedom
to salvage our own rights from our hypocritical government.
Since Sept. 11, the U.S. government has violated some of the
most basic universal human rights, and this bill means that such
violations will undoubtedly become more frequent occurrences. Over
the past six weeks, nearly 1,000 unidentified “suspected
terrorists” have been arrested and detained in undisclosed
locations throughout the country. Denied access to legal assistance
or a fair trial, these people have essentially disappeared.
More disturbing still is the fact that people can be detained or
deported for “providing assistance for lawful activities of a
group the government claims is a terrorist organization.”
Whether or not such organizations have ever had any history of any
kind of terrorist activity is no longer a concern.
What does this mean?
If you are a non-citizen and pay your Amnesty International
dues, or offer anti-globalization protesters a bed for the night,
you could be deported.
It’s that simple.
Permanent residents are also at risk. If individuals exercise
their right to free speech and criticize the American government
while abroad, they could be barred from returning to their lives
here. Ever bad-mouthed Bush? This time around, you could be exiled
for it.
The USA PATRIOT Act is an example of a government running amok.
It does not protect Americans; rather, it bullies us into silent
submission and eliminates critical citizen discourse. The threat of
Big Brother watching our every move is our government’s
attempt to eliminate dissent by terrorizing innocent citizens.
Finally, consider this. Sept. 11 was not a result of laws
restricting intelligence here in the United States. Many of the
provisions in the Anti-Terrorism Bill have existed in more
constitutional forms for decades. In other words, government
officials had more than enough tools to gather information that
could have prevented the attacks. They simply failed to use them.
Clearly, preventing a repeat performance is not as simple as
destroying every civil liberty Americans have ever had.
I, for one, have a more appropriate name for this piece of
repressive legislation ““ a name that more accurately depicts
what Americans will face in the coming months and years. It’s
TOTALITARIAN: Threats Of Torture, Abuse, and Loss of liberty at the
hands of Intelligence Terrorists Acting Righteously and Ignoring
Accountability in the Name of security.
Click here for Mitra Ebadolahi’s opposing
column
Sacrifice of citizens’ rights needed to create
security
DEBATE: Terrorists thrive on leftist complaints
regarding infringement on civil liberties
 Ben Shapiro Shapiro is a second-year
political science student bringing reason to the masses. E-mail him
at [email protected].
Click
Here for more articles by Ben Shapiro
Tap the phones. Intercept the e-mails. Do whatever it takes to
protect American lives.
President George W. Bush’s anti-terrorism bill, HR 3162,
gives police “unprecedented ability to search, detain or
eavesdrop in their pursuit of possible terrorists.” The bill
gives police the ability to secretly search the houses of terrorist
suspects. It stiffens penalties for terrorist actions. And federal
law-enforcement authorities have jumped on the bandwagon. Says
Bush, “This government will enforce this law with all the
urgency of a nation at war.”
Good. It’s time for Americans to get tough.
These are the consequences of war. It is a sad truth that
whenever there is war, some liberties must be curtailed for the
sake of safety. And especially in a war as insidious and
underground as this one, with terrorists implanted in the heart of
America, a broad net of suspicion must be cast over the public.
Somewhere, in some house or apartment or hotel, in New York or
Chicago or Los Angeles, operatives of evil dwell. The reality is
that the government does not know of all the terrorists. The
government cannot pinpoint the exact location of every murderer
leeching off America’s prosperity while planning its
destruction. Potential terrorists spring up every day around the
world. They compose a fifth column in most countries. They form a
brigade of violence, planning horror and slaughter. They plan to
bring down Western society through physical and psychological
means. But they cannot succeed alone.
They are helped by those who say “America must not strike
back.” They love to hear leftists preach “love
toward the misunderstood terrorists.” They thrive on
media portrayal of terrorists as “militants,” of
murderers as “oppressed.” And there is nothing
more comforting for a terrorist than to hear whining liberals
attempting to stop the progress of law-enforcement by crying that
they don’t want their “privacy invaded.”
Terrorists are a cancer growing and eating away at the body of
freedom and justice. They have metastasized throughout the world.
And like a doctor who must give a patient chemotherapy, the
government must give the public collective chemotherapy. A cancer
patient cannot afford to sit around and wait. Neither can the
United States. Phones must be tapped. E-mails must be
read. Movement must be monitored. Houses must be searched. Law
enforcement authorities are not the “bad guys” out to
get us.
The FBI doesn’t give a damn if you have a copy of
“The Communist Manifesto” in your bedroom or believe
that Cuba has a great health-care system ““ they want the
terrorists. The first priority of the government is, and must be,
the protection of its citizens.
Terrorists use codes. They don’t always use the same
phones. They converse in chat rooms. The government must have the
ability to monitor these discussions, and the government must have
the ability to do this secretly. Terrorists are not your
typical Venice Beach stoners ““ if they know their equipment
has been tapped or searched, they will change codes, move away,
throw the government off their trail. This means increased danger
to the American populace.
The bill has already begun to yield results. The New York Post
reported on October 31 that the latest terror alert issued by the
Department of Justice was sparked by phone taps. Phone calls
intercepted in Afghanistan revealed al-Qaeda operatives speaking in
code about a “big event.” Wouldn’t that type of
information have been useful preceding the Sept. 11 attacks?
This bill does not make law-enforcement unaccountable. Congress
has already put an expiration date on the eavesdropping section of
the bill. And the pit of ignorance that is the ACLU has vowed to
keep a close watch on the proceedings.
Leftists believe that government will become “Big
Brother.” Leftists are afraid that their “civil
liberties will tampered with.” Stop whining, hypocrites.
You say that government should have control of the economy; you say
that government should have control of property; you say that
government should control the environment. Yet you say government
should not have control of national security? You believe that
Americans should continue being killed to “make a
statement?” Or are you just afraid for yourselves? Do you
fear that the government will find something which confirms your
status as anti-America and anti-freedom? Are you hiding some deep,
dark sympathy for the terrorists? Or far worse, are you aiding
them?
Only those who are anti-America and pro-terrorism and oppression
should fear this bill. Only those who believe in the essential
righteousness of terrorist thought should whimper over this
“abridgement of their civil liberties.” The rest of us
have nothing to fear. The cancer will be killed and the health of
the nation will be restored. But a return to normalcy can be built
only after the cancer is uprooted.
Click here for Mitra Ebadolahi’s opposing
column