It's down to self-professed socialist Bernie Sanders to propose an amendment that at least manages to curtail a little of Big Brother's power. The House have passed an amendment that blocks the FBI and Justice Dept. from using the Patriot Act to peek at library records and bookstore sales slips.
It must be an unpleasant slap in the face for those who have no real conception of what a socialist actually is to see such a staunch defence of freedom from one. I expect they will simply blank it, deny it, and go back to their silly 1950's prejudices.
Supporters of rolling back the library and bookstore provision said that the law gives the FBI too much leeway to go on fishing expeditions on people's reading habits and that innocent people could get tagged as potential terrorists based on what they check out from a library.
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Supporters of the Patriot Act countered that the rules on reading records are a potentially useful tool in finding terrorists and argued that the House was voting to make libraries safe havens for them.
The provision that originally existed has seemingly never been used, which shows how dangerous libraries are as meeting places of terrorists. Still, you can never be sure according to the security paranoid. It's the same mindset that argues cell phones could be used to set of bombs on airplanes so we better ban that too. But homegrown militia with assault weapons are just fine. What a nation of wimps America is becoming, scared of the man in mufti lurking around every corner and in every library. It's reminiscent of "reefer madness".
Quote of the Day
Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.
Helen Keller
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