Preserving Life and Liberty?

Do you feel safer now than you did two years ago? John Ashcroft thinks you should, and he's spending your tax dollars on a month-long publicity tour for the U.S.A. Patriot Act trying to convince you. He even has a web site: Preserving Life & Liberty.

I understand that we live in a dangerous world and that some restrictions on our personal liberty may be necessary to ensure our safety. Unlike a lot of people, I don't resent the additional security at airports. I'm pleased to see it. But there's something about Ashcroft that scares me. He seems never to have heard of a surveillance technique that he didn't want to use, and seems not to notice that there's a problem when the President can declare a U.S. citizen to be an "enemy combatant", depriving that person of all normal rights of a criminal defendant. Granted, the "enemy combatant" ploy isn't part of the Patriot Act, but how much confidence can you expect me to put in an Attorney General who defends it? How can you expect me to believe him when he tells me the Patriot Act needs to give him more intrusive power?

I'm sorry. I don't trust John Ashcroft any further than I can spit, and I can barely miss my toes.