LTTE to NYT on Patriot Act, Rudy Giuliani's Bullcrap.

[Inland]

I thought they were all pithy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/21/opinion/l21giuliani.html?pagewanted=all

To the Editor:

Re "Taking Liberties With the Nation's Security," by Rudolph W. Giuliani (Op-Ed, Dec. 17):

If it is true, as Mr. Giuliani asserts, that there are terrorists who "seek to destroy our liberties," doesn't it then stand to reason that every time President Bush and other government officials enact or authorize procedures that curtail or suspend our freedoms, they are providing victories to these very same terrorists?

Ronnie Bauch
New York, Dec. 18, 2005

•

To the Editor:

Rudolph W. Giuliani says that we shouldn't let terrorists take away our liberties. We should let our government take them away instead, to protect us from terrorists.

Sept. 11, 2001, has been used to justify abuse of executive power for four years. Over and over, President Bush has been telling us to trust him rather than our own eyes and ears.

Now the president has admitted that he authorized the National Security Agency to spy on Americans, but tells us not to worry because it's for our own good.

How much more apparent does it need to be that this administration is not at all interested in protecting the liberty this country is supposed to stand for?

Mr. Giuliani says that the proposed extension of the USA Patriot Act would revise the law to prevent curtailment of civil liberties. For some reason, with an administration with such a warped view of liberty, I am not comforted.

Angela Coppola
Brooklyn, Dec. 17, 2005

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To the Editor:

The USA Patriot Act clearly infringes upon the civil liberties of American citizens.

In 2001, after the Sept. 11 attacks, Americans believed and trusted their government leaders not to abuse this exceptional power. Consequently, Congress passed the legislation to help the administration carry out its war on terrorism.

Today, after the W.M.D. fiasco in Iraq, the Abu Ghraib abuses, the National Security Agency wiretapping and more, the American people no longer have faith that this administration will not abuse the powers provided in the Patriot Act. The Senate's refusal to extend the act on Friday reflected this growing distrust of this administration.

James Williams
Scarsdale, N.Y., Dec. 17, 2005

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To the Editor:

Rudolph W. Giuliani says that the USA Patriot Act was passed "after six weeks of intense scrutiny and debate." This is historical revisionism.

This measure was rushed through Congress so quickly that most members had no idea of the details embedded in it. Great changes in security procedures were put through without considered debate, in frantic reaction to the worst terrorist attack in American history.

Most House Democrats were not even given a copy of the bill until shortly before the vote.

At the time, many observers described the bill as a compendium of extreme proposals that had been repeatedly rejected in the past as inconsistent with our nation's traditions of respect for personal privacy and due process of law.

Whatever the merits of renewing the measure now, let's not pretend that its original adoption was part of a careful, measured and deliberative process.

Arthur S. Leonard
New York, Dec. 17, 2005
The writer is a professor at New York Law School.

[shenmue]

1. All on target

B*** has accomplished what the terrorists couldn't do--take away our rights.

:mad:

The list of the things he's done is beginning to sound like the deeds of King George III listed in the Declaration of Independence.