posted by Damozel | A follow-up to an audit by the inspector-general found that "found the FBI demanded [through national security letters] personal data on people from banks, telephone
and Internet providers and credit bureaus without official
authorization and in non-emergency circumstances between 2003 and 2005." (MSNBC; emphasis added). In case you didn't know it, national security letters are "administrative subpoenas that can be
issued under the USA Patriot Act in terror and spy investigations."(MSNBC) Apparently an FBI agent who has one of those can get access to all sorts of records.
It's a testament to the Bush Administration that I don't even feel outraged, just wearily resigned and drearily content to believe that someday, somehow there will be a reckoning. The truth will out, etc. etc. As to this report: what else is new? Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, one of my personal heroes in Congress, asked FBI Director Mueller to be more vigilant in correcting "widespread illegal and improper use of national security letters." (MSNBC) Why, yes. That sounds like a plan. Leahy said:
"Everybody wants to stop terrorists. But we also, though, as Americans, we believe in our privacy rights and we want those protected....There has to be a better chain of command for this. You cannot just have an FBI agent who decides he'd like to obtain Americans' records, bank records or anything else and do it just because they want to."(MSNBC)
But though I hate to contradict Sen. Leahy, he is mistaken. Apparently you can.
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