Fox News: Libraries Rally Against USA Patriot Act

[shanek]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,86167,00.html

Czesak, like hundreds of her fellow librarians around the country, says the Patriot Act makes what people read and borrow from libraries fair game in the name of tracking terrorists.

Libraries in Santa Cruz, Calif., posted signs warning patrons that the FBI may access the records of what books they borrow.

The Paterson Public Library in New Jersey is even getting rid of records like computer sign-up sheets.

"After that it's removed and destroyed … we bought a nice new shredder," Czesak said.

Good for them.

[crackmonkey]

This is such a non-issue... I'm glad the librarians are using this opportunity to get all self-righteous.

[schplurg]

I agree Shane. That is most excellent!

I heard a woman on the radio who was involved with the California library 'system' somehow. I can't remember her title (head of The Ministry of Libraries? ;)) Anyways, she was saying how some libraries are voluntarily destroying records within 3 days to combat the Patriot Act. It's a start.

Don't you just love the name "Patriot" Act. Please...

Sorry no link.

[Bjorn]

Originally posted by shanek
Good for them. Agreed.

There must be a limit to how much we allow 'authorities' to collect information about people who are presumably innocent. At least read me a Miranda first, so I can think before I borrow ... :(

[corplinx]

I love this. Librarians are so unimportant that they have to pretend the government is fishing through their records to make themselves seem relevant.

Nothing in the patriot act allows the gov to go on fishing trips through records. There is no database of all your library checkouts somewhere deep beneath the justice dept.

This paranoia and overreaction is starting to get tiresome.

[UnrepentantSinner]

Whew, this means I don't have to worry about what the feds might assume from my repeated borrowing of Lolita.

[Richard G]

I've already read several reports of the Feds walking into libraries and asking for, then confiscating records. I wish I still had the links, this was a few months ago.

[Bjorn]

Originally posted by corplinx
I love this. Librarians are so unimportant that they have to pretend the government is fishing through their records to make themselves seem relevant.

Nothing in the patriot act allows the gov to go on fishing trips through records. There is no database of all your library checkouts somewhere deep beneath the justice dept.

This paranoia and overreaction is starting to get tiresome. No database?

Under one provision of the law, the secret court that administers the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (search) can order businesses, including libraries, to hand over records I guess the records must be there to have the potential of being handed over? :confused:

Justice Department officials say the librarians are misreading the Patriot Act. They say it strengthens the government's ability to protect citizens from terrorists who live and operate among us. Of course it does. All ways of monitoring/controlling Americans' life will 'strenghten the ability to protect citizens'.

FBI/CIA cameras inside all private residences, all hotel rooms and basically everywhere, would do it even better. It would also stop much of domestic crime. How come we still don't want those cameras? :p

[Denise]

Question:

When someone uses a computer at a library do they have to sign in and out?

The reason I asked this is that one can get so much info on the computer that checking who checked out what book is kind of irrelevent.

I agree with Shane and others. This is getting a little overboard.

Also, it is penalizing people who cannot afford to buy books and must get them from the library.

Do terrorists hang out at libraries? Seems the 911 gang had plenty of money to buy books with cash- no trail.

[Clancie]

You know what? I am frankly much more afraid of the government abuse of power than I am of terrorists.

Bush, Ashcroft, Rumsfield & Co. show time and again they place no value in the concepts of our Constitution and the protection of individual rights by law.

The worst Presidency in U.S. history.

That is my prediction of how George ("Please, only four years of him!!!") Bush will be remembered.

[corplinx]

Pop Quiz: without spinning, spell out exactly what the patriot act has changed regarding getting informations from government libraries

[peptoabysmal]

Originally posted by Denise
Question:

When someone uses a computer at a library do they have to sign in and out?

The reason I asked this is that one can get so much info on the computer that checking who checked out what book is kind of irrelevent.

I agree with Shane and others. This is getting a little overboard.

Also, it is penalizing people who cannot afford to buy books and must get them from the library.

Do terrorists hang out at libraries? Seems the 911 gang had plenty of money to buy books with cash- no trail.

When I'm working on that thermonuclear warhead in my basement, I always go for the the hardcopy instructions. Online manuals only go so far ;)

[Denise]

Originally posted by peptoabysmal


When I'm working on that thermonuclear warhead in my basement, I always go for the the hardcopy instructions. Online manuals only go so far ;)

I'll have you know that I have bomb shelter up my sleeves. And canned food. Lots of canned food...:D

[subgenius]

Originally posted by shanek
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,86167,00.html





Good for them.
Librarians rock!
Everyone else can put their heads in the sand (up their butts).
Just like (insert pre-war Germany reference).

[PygmyPlaidGiraffe]

Originally posted by corplinx
... Librarians are so unimportant that they have to pretend the government is fishing through their records to make themselves seem relevant.


From (blech) Fox News sources




mayhaps they do have an over inflated sense of self, but it was the government that passed the Patriot Act, and it may include the following, though many of the included provisions are top secret.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,84320,00.html

Passed weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, the USA Patriot Act granted the government broad new powers to use wiretaps, electronic and computer eavesdropping and searches and the authority to access a wide range of financial and other information in its investigations. It also broke down the traditional wall between FBI investigators and intelligence agents.

...

From the link in Shanek's origional post


The measure requires local governments to disclose personal information -- such as library records -- about certain people who may be connected to a terror investigation. FBI agents can obtain a warrant for library or bookstore records of anyone thought to be involved in a plot. Librarians then aren't allowed to discuss the investigation.

Powers to use wiretaps and label religious and political groups as terrorists also were expanded under the act.

Under one provision of the law, the secret court that administers the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (search) can order businesses, including libraries, to hand over records for terrorism investigations.

....

Among the advocates is Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, who isn't waiting on 2005 to craft legislation to extend the life of the law.

....


Last week, Hatch sought to extend the act through an amendment to a bill that would further expand government wiretapping authority under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Lawmakers left for their Easter break before considering it.

"It seems to me to be ridiculous to take away the best law enforcement tool against terrorism before we get rid of terrorism," said Hatch, R-Utah. "This bill has helped us protect ourselves from terrorism both inside and outside the country. It's a tough bill, but it's constitutional and it works."




So corplinx, where is the ambiguity? I can understand if you mentioned the ACLU's or the librarians' interpretations of the Acts were exagerated to illicit outrage. I see these two groups as watch-dogs that can help citizens scrutinize and debate what is needed to balance security and individual rights.

[Tricky]

Originally posted by Clancy
Bush, Ashcroft, Rumsfield & Co. show time and again they place no value in the concepts of our Constitution and the protection of individual rights by law.

The worst Presidency in U.S. history.

That is my prediction of how George ("Please, only four years of him!!!") Bush will be remembered.
You are not alone in that opinion. Helen Thomas (http://dailybreeze.copleypress.org/content/bog/thomas19.html), who has covered every president since Kennedy and has been called on at every press conference for fourty years, said the same thing. This quickly ended her string of being called on at press conferences.

[zakur]

The USA Patriot Act in the Library (http://www.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Our_Association/Offices/Intellectual_Freedom3/Intellectual_Freedom_Issues/The_USA_Patriot_Act_in_the_Library.htm)

FBI in Your Library (http://www.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Our_Association/Offices/Intellectual_Freedom3/Intellectual_Freedom_Issues/FBI_in_Your_Library.htm)

And don't forget, it's not just libraries we're talking about here, but book stores as well:

American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (http://www.abffe.org/)

[Mike B.]

Originally posted by Clancy
You know what? I am frankly much more afraid of the government abuse of power than I am of terrorists.

Bush, Ashcroft, Rumsfield & Co. show time and again they place no value in the concepts of our Constitution and the protection of individual rights by law.

The worst Presidency in U.S. history.

That is my prediction of how George ("Please, only four years of him!!!") Bush will be remembered.

What about James Buchanan and Warren G. Harding or Richard Nixon?

[shanek]

Originally posted by crackmonkey
This is such a non-issue... I'm glad the librarians are using this opportunity to get all self-righteous.

I'm so glad you see flagrantly unconstitutional violations of our Fourth Amendment rights as a "non-issue"... :rolleyes:

[crackmonkey]

Librarians - the last bastion of liberty. You can have my library records when you pry them out of their cold, dead hands...:rolleyes:

As far as Bush being the worst President... hardly. Then again, I'd say Helen Thomas was easily the worst correspondent...

[shanek]

Originally posted by corplinx
I love this. Librarians are so unimportant that they have to pretend the government is fishing through their records to make themselves seem relevant.

They don't have to pretend anything; it's happening. The University of Illinois did a study on how many Libraries have had requests from the government to turn over information relating to their patrons after only one year of the Patriot Act. If their findings are accurate, then over 1300 public libraries nationwide have received such requests!

Nothing in the patriot act allows the gov to go on fishing trips through records.

Not at all true. Section 215 of the act allows the government to serve "an order requiring the production of any tangible things (including books, records, papers, documents, and other items) for an investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities...An order under this subsection shall not disclose that it is issued for purposes of an investigation...No person shall disclose to any other person...that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has sought or obtained tangible things under this section."

This paranoia and overreaction is starting to get tiresome.

Paranoia? Overreaction? Tell that to Lynne Stewart, Jose Padilla, and all of the others that people like you ignore whenever I bring them up.

REAL people are having their RIGHTS violated by this despicable Act!

[crackmonkey]

I don't know... I have a hard time getting worked up over this. Examining public library records isn't the same thing as breaking into a private residence and rummaging through it for evidence.
I don't see how library records are any different from any other government records on a person. Police can examine phone and credit records - a far greater intrusion into personal liberties than library records.
Tempest in a teacup.

[subgenius]

Originally posted by crackmonkey
Then again, I'd say Helen Thomas was easily the worst correspondent...
Read a lot of her stuff, and compared it to the others?

[crackmonkey]

Yeah, I've read some of her stuff. I find it trite and mediocre. I'd put her in the same company as Maureen Dowd, but without the literary pretensions... in other words, self-important yet insubstantial. More attitude than content.

[Richard G]

Everyone say hello to the FBI, this thread is bound to wind up in their PREDATOR program. (CHEESE! Take a picture it'll last longer)