Saturday, October 01, 2005
Patriot Games: Thousands of Americans improperly wiretapped
From an AOL online poll
The Patriot Act should:
Be scrapped altogether 46%
Be scaled back 28%
Be expanded 26%
Which is of more concern to you right now?
Protecting my civil liberties 61%
Protecting the U.S. from terrorists 39%
Total Votes: 36,230
They were reacting to this: "The FBI says it sometimes gets the wrong number when it intercepts conversations in terrorism investigations, an admission critics say underscores a need to revise wiretap provisions in the Patriot Act.The FBI would not say how often these mistakes happen....The 38,514 untranslated hours included an undetermined number from what the FBI called "collections of materials from the wrong sources due to technical problems." (Mark Sherman, AP, 10/1/05)
Thirty eight thousand hours of suddenly-not-very-interesting conversations? Even a very gabby person might talk three hours on the phone. Suppose it takes three days to figure out the Bureau has the wrong line tapped.
We're talking about thousands of people who are being improperly investigated.
We need to know whether these people disproportionately represent political opponents of the Bush Administration. Congress, do your duty!
More blogs about politics.
