PATRIOTic Acts
By Demand Progress.org, which is doing extremely important work on IT and civil liberties, has just sent me an email requesting me to join progressive Americans in “jamming the White House phone lines” urging President Obama to keep his campaign promise to “fix the PATRIOT Act.”
I’m more than happy to sign a petition or call the White House, but aside from the fact that I’m not exactly holding my breath for him to keep his campaign promises, I was a little worried by one of the talking points being disseminated by DP, which reads:
* Protect the privacy of our Internet and financial records by requiring that secret National Security Letters and Section 215 orders can only be used to obtain records linked to suspected spies and terrorists, not innocent Americans.
Actually, we may want progressives to remember “suspected” spies and terrorists actually are innocent Americans, if they are American and until they are proven guilty, at which point they are no longer “suspects.”