The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of United States of America is a restraint imposed on the federal government. It tells them that our privacy is off-limits to their prying eyes unless certain conditions are met for them to ask a court to allow them to look. Our privacy is our property, and cannot be violated, period. To better understand this, lets read what is stated in the Fourth Amendment:
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.
One can clearly see by the wording of the Fourth Amendment that "the people" are not given any rights. It assumes that "the people" had rights from the beginning. From the moment we draw in our first breath, we have the right to be secure against unreasonable searches and unreasonable seizures. Lets look at it another way. What stops me from kicking the door in at my neighbor's house while he's at work and snooping through his stuff? My respect of his property and privacy. In my view, he has as much right to carry on in his private affairs as I.
So, we have Sen. Pat Roberts, who is the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, telling us that, "The nation expects the FBI to prevent terrorist attacks. With terrorists willing to hijack planes and acquire weapons of mass destruction, failure is too costly. Congress cannot hold the FBI accountable for failures to pre-empt terrorism while asking it to fight the threat with one hand tied behind its back. We must give the FBI every constitutional tool available to win the battle." And, he's right. We do expect the FBI and every other agency to try their best to keep us safe from terrorism. I personally expect the local police department to keep me safe from being murdered, but I'm also smart enough to know that they will never be able to do that unless they follow me where ever I go. I certainly don't want that. As far as his comment about giving the FBI all the constitutional tools to win the battle... If Mr. Roberts is trying to imply that the USAPATRIOT Act and this latest abomination are Constitutional, he had better find another line of work before we arrest him for violating his oath of office. Read below for some facts about what Mr. Roberts and his henchmen are trying to impose on the good people of these United States: The draft legislation has a number of troubling provisions, including ones that would: -
Provide the FBI with expanded power to seize personal records from medical facilities, libraries, hotels, gun dealers, banks and any other businesses. With these "administrative subpoenas," agents could act without having to appear before a judge to justify the search or having to show that the targeted individuals are suspected of criminal activity.
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Create unchecked authority to track people's mail without any meaningful protections against abuse of such snooping.
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Through a legalistic end run, exempt a new class of searches from the restraints imposed by the Bill of Rights.
Why are people not up in arms over this? Hello? Is this thing on?!? We are being enslaved by the police state our government is turning itself into. If we don't act now to stop these criminals, it will be too late after they've divided us up. We will never be as strong as we are right now. This is a frontal assault on our liberty by the Congress and the Executive branch. By their actions, they have declared war on the American people. The evidence is there for all the people to read. They aren't concerned with protecting us. They mean to rule us. The Constitution is dead. We must act now to save ourselves from this growing oppression.
