Tag: Homeland Security

Paging Judge Danforth.

“Two senators – one a conservative Republican, the other a moderate Democrat – who spoke with Ashcroft…were surprised at his lack of command of the basic issues. Whether it was lack of interest or lack of intellectual firepower, the Attorney General seemed not to appreciate the complexities of the constitutional issues he was dealing with.” Nat Hentoff cites Stephen Brill’s After to depict amateur hour in the Ashcroft Justice Department.

Enemies in our midst.

“If I felt that my neighbor of 10 years was doing fundraising for a group, I’d turn ’em in…[the FBI will] just investigate them, and if you’re wrong, you’re wrong. And if you’re right, that’s a big thing!” In other words, report your neighbor! What’s the harm? Suspicion breeds confidence! The Voice‘s James Ridgeway notes the proliferation of Cat Eyes, a neighborhood “civil defense” group encouraging citizens to look out for suspicious behavior. Underneath the spreading chestnut tree…

The Smoking Gun.

Speaking of the Exterminator, his successor as Majority Whip – Roy Blunt – has recently illustrated De Lay-levels of corruption with his attempt to protect Phillip Morris from terrorism in the Homeland Security Act. “Blunt’s attempt became known only to a small circle of House and White House officials. They kept it quiet, preferring no publicity on a matter involving favors for the nation’s biggest tobacco company and possible claims of conflicts of interest.” Strange how the GOP always seems to promote its sketchiest members to the whip.

More! More!

Like a junkie looking for another fix, Ashcroft takes time away from putting down gay pride events to beg Congress for increased powers in fighting terrorism. If the death penalty doesn’t even work as a deterrent in “normal” crime, why would it stop terrorists?

The Trail at Yale.

Investigators try to ascertain exactly what happened at Yale Law School yesterday. At first I figured it might have been some disgruntled Kaczynski type. But now that it turns out the alleged bomb exploded in a classroom rather than the mailroom, my guess is some bored Elis were testing out their copy of The Anarchist’s Cookbook. Either way, two random classrooms in New Haven seem an unlikely target for Al-Qaeda.

We only lock up the bad people.

The Justice Department gives its most detailed accounting yet of how its used its post-9/11 powers in the war on terror, although the vagueness of the report does little to satisfy congressional critics and civil liberties advocates. On a loosely related note, it must be some weird cosmic irony that the spokesperson for the Ashcroft Justice Dept. is named Comstock.

Wages of Fear.

In keeping with his right-on-terror campaign strategy, Senator Bob Graham accuses Dubya of a 9/11 coverup. While I don’t particularly care for Graham’s brand of fear-mongering, he’s got a point this time around…that congressional report should be made public, and particularly if the centerpiece of Dubya’s re-election campaign will involve waving the bloody shirt as planned.

Now for ruin, and a red dawn.

It looks like the worst-case scenario outlined by Alternet yesterday is coming about sooner than expected. Senator Orrin Hatch leads a GOP charge to eliminate the sunset provisions in the Patriot Act, thus making permanent the sweeping antiterrorism provisions of the first bill and setting the stage for PATRIOT II. Let’s hope Hatch doesn’t have the votes.

Don’t suspect a friend – report him.

Wiretaps, deportations, DNA databases, secret arrests, you name it. Alternet summarizes the many dangerous implications of PATRIOT II, Attorney General Ashcroft’s upcoming salvo against American civil liberties. The Bushies are going to need another war to pass this one off on us. (Via Genehack, whom I’ve got my eye on…)