The U.S. Patriot Act

Soon after the September 11th terrorist attacks there were a new set of rules to be enforced virtually worldwide. The USA Patriot Act was introduced a mere 6 weeks after the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. Instead of helping in the potential capture of these terrorists, like it was supposedly created to do, the Patriot Act strips Americans of the basic civil liberties and freedoms that the country is known for. Under the Patriot Act the FBI can confiscate ?any tangible thing? (Halloran 2) from any given business. This basically makes a search warrant obsolete. It?s as if police could just walk into any house that they please and start snooping around for ?intelligence?. It wasn?t until 4 years after its introduction that the Act started catching the people?s attention, or maybe just the attention of President Bush and his staff. Some new ?tools? the act provides are domestic searches, seizures, different kinds of electronic surveillance, and wiretaps.

Screenchot of USA PATRIOT Act (German Wikipedia)

President George W. Bush addresses an audience Wed...

English: U.S. Senator Russ Feingold spoke on the S...

Are the act?s really necessary to ?root? out the terrorists living in this country, considering how many American Citizens actually live here? The Patriot Act points the finger at virtually anyone and everyone, sticking its foot in the door liberty and justice.

One particularly infringing rule in the act has to deal with customers or employees of a given business. This rule states that the government can demand any personal records from these people, yet not have to inform them about doing so. This is aiding in the capture of terrorists? Maybe this is why over 400 communities from across the nation passed resolutions in order to reform the Patriot Act. Due to the pressure from the White House however, the Congress didn?t acknowledge these people. When the act was first introduced there was a mere 1 senator...