Urgent! Look What They Try to Sneak In: Vote to Renew Patriot Act Provisions on Tuesday February 8, 2011

US Congress and the Obumbum administration probably correctly believe we the sheeple simply don't have time to pay any attention to anything other than the 2011 Super Bowl, snow, the Egyptian Revolution, American Idol, and rising gasoline and food prices.

They are going to vote on renewal of the key provisions of the Patriot Act TOMORROW, Tuesday February 8, 2011, the Act which has most recently given us the pornographic pat-downs and scans at the airports.

If Congress does not extend these provisions, they are set to expire on February 28, 2011. The new Congress with Republican majority is expected to easily pass the bill to renew the provisions.

CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSMEN ASAP!!!

It's time we stood up like Egyptians.

From Washington's Blog:

The ACLU reports:

Three sections of the Patriot Act — the so-called 'library provision' that allows a secret court to issue orders for anything deemed relevant to an investigation; the roving wiretap provision that allows the government to get a wiretap order that doesn't specify the person or place to be tapped; and the 'lone wolf' provision, which permits intelligence wiretapping of people not connected to a terrorist group — are scheduled to expire on February 28. It's February 7.

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Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) recently suggested that Congress doesn't have enough time to consider reforms this year. That was the excuse for last year's Patriot Act reauthorization. Members of Congress had suggested that they would use 2010 to really examine the effects of the USA Patriot Act and return to it in early 2011 ready to make much-needed changes.

And where are we now? Well, Congress is betting that while they weren't thinking about the Patriot Act in the past year, you weren't either. Late in the day on Friday, we learned that the House will vote tomorrow, Tuesday, Feb. 8, on a bill to extend the expiring Patriot Act provisions until December 8, 2011. They want to sneak this reauthorization through, and they're hoping that you don't notice.

Well, once again, we're asking you to tell Congress that you are watching, that you don't buy their fear-mongering or their scare tactics, and that you want real Patriot Act reform. We've put a new action alert up urging Congress not to rubber stamp the Patriot Act once again, and we urge you to take action. For almost 10 years, the Patriot Act has given the government too much leeway to pry into our private lives.

As the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others have documented (see this, this and this), the Patriot Act would not have prevented 9/11, and has led to numerous crimes by the FBI and other agencies.

Call Congress NOW and tell them to vote down renewing the Patriot Act. Word from D.C. is that the Patriot Act will be renewed unless there is strong public outcry today.

Remember, the Patriot Act was apparently written before 9/11, and the government's spying on Americans began before 9/11 (confirmed here and here. And see this) . These assault on the Constitution did not keep us safe.

Indeed - as I've previously noted - the "national security" apparatus has been hijacked to serve the needs of big business, and is not really protecting us.

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