[SunStar]

We're at war with terrorists. The Patriot Act helps us arrest terrorists. Over and out.

[Biker Pat]

Agreed.

Ironically, it is our civil rights and our freedoms which will be used to bring us down, as an enemy with no such values uses them to cause us to impose limitations on our own self defense. Actually, it is not so much our freedoms which will do us in, it is our recent cultural insistence that freedoms are absolute and indepenedent of any obligations or responsibilities on the part of those using them.

[freepatriot32]

We're at war with terrorists. The Patriot Act helps us arrest terrorists. Over and out.

Click the links

A New Jersey man accused with using a laser to beam pilots of two planes has been charged under the Patriot Act. The FBI has acknowledged that the incident does not have any relation to terrorism but called David Banach's actions "foolhardy and negligent."

"An analysis of the Justice Department's own list of terrorism prosecutions by The Washington Post shows that 39 people, not 200, as officials have implied, were convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security."

The Post report said, "Most of the others were convicted of relatively minor crimes such as making false statements and violating immigration law and had nothing to do with terrorism."

Treasury Department figures reviewed by Newsweek show that this year the Feds have used the Patriot Act to conduct searches on 962 suspects, yielding "hits" on 6,397 financial records. Of those, two thirds (4,261) were in money-laundering cases with no terror connection. Among the agencies making requests, Newsweek has learned, were the IRS (which investigates tax fraud), the Postal Service (postal fraud) and the Secret Service counterfeiting). One request came from the Agriculture Department -- a case that apparently involved food stamp fraud.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri filed an action against PayPal for violating the PATRIOT Act (18 U.S.C. 1960), based on PayPal's use in processing funds transfered for online gambling.

There are other troublesome aspects of The Patriot Act. Take, for example, Title III, aimed at money laundering. This became part of the Act at the insistence of Democrats that include Senators Daschle and Kerry. The Justice Department has used it to investigate corruption allegations against a Las Vegas strip club owner!