The horrifying and insidious “PATRIOT” Act rears it’s ugly head again.
Did you know that it gives the Feds the power to force satellite companies to turn over information about your viewing habits – as we all know, whether or not you watch the Playboy channel is significant to any terrorism investigation. From TelevisionWeek via Gizmodo:
Could the federal government find out what you’re watching on TV? Even if you’re not the subject of a criminal investigation?
If you’re a satellite TV or TiVo owner, the answer is yes, according to legal experts and industry officials.
Under the USA Patriot Act, passed a month after the 9/11 terrorist attack, the feds can force a noncable TV operator to disclose every show you have watched. The government just has to say that the request is related to a terrorism investigation, said Jay Stanley, a technology expert for the American Civil Liberties Union.
Under Section 215 of the Act, you don’t even have to be the target of the investigation. Plus, your TV provider is prohibited from informing you that the feds have requested your personal information.
Does anyone really know all the dangerous little clauses in this thing? If we did, would we have ever allowed such a thing to become law? Or did September 11 just completely blind us? This piece of legislation sounds like something that a shadowy state like North Korea or — gasp — Iraq might use to spy on it’s citizens.
Every day I am more and more horrified by the raping of this country’s great freedoms by Bush, Cheney, Ashcroft, and the whole gaggle of neoconservatives, who claim to love their country but spend so much time dismantling it.
