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New Frontiers for the Police State
Unfathomed Dangers in Patriot Act Reauthorization
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
01/24/06 "Lew
Rockwell" -- -- A provision in the "Patriot Act"
creates a new federal police force with power to violate the
Bill of Rights. You might think that this cannot be true as you
have not read about it in newspapers or heard it discussed by
talking heads on TV.
Go to House Report 109-333 -USA PATRIOT IMPROVEMENT AND
REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2005 and check it out for yourself.
Sec. 605 reads:
"There is hereby created and established a permanent police
force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service
Uniformed Division'."
This new federal police force is "subject to the supervision of
the Secretary of Homeland Security."
The new police are empowered to "make arrests without warrant
for any offense against the United States committed in their
presence, or for any felony cognizable under the laws of the
United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe that
the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such
felony."
The new police are assigned a variety of jurisdictions,
including "an event designated under section 3056(e) of title 18
as a special event of national significance" (SENS).
"A special event of national significance" is neither defined
nor does it require the presence of a "protected person" such as
the president in order to trigger it. Thus, the administration,
and perhaps the police themselves, can place the SENS
designation on any event. Once a SENS designation is placed on
an event, the new federal police are empowered to keep out and
to arrest people at their discretion.
The language conveys enormous discretionary and arbitrary
powers.
What is "an offense against the United States"? What are
"reasonable grounds"?
You can bet that the Alito/Roberts court will rule that it is
whatever the executive branch says.
The obvious purpose of the act is to prevent demonstrations at
Bush/Cheney events. However, nothing in the language limits the
police powers from being used only in this way. Like every law
in the US, this law also will be expansively interpreted and
abused. It has dire implications for freedom of association and
First Amendment rights.
We can take for granted that the new federal police will be used
to suppress dissent and to break up opposition. The Brownshirts
are now arming themselves with a Gestapo.
Many naive Americans will write to me to explain that this new
provision in the reauthorization of the "Patriot Act" is
necessary to protect the president and other high officials from
terrorists or from harm at the hands of angry demonstrators: "No
one else will have anything to fear." Some will accuse me of
being an alarmist, and others will say that it is unpatriotic to
doubt the law's good intentions.
Americans will write such nonsense despite the fact that the
president and foreign dignitaries are already provided superb
protection by the Secret Service. The naive will not comprehend
that the president cannot be endangered by demonstrators at SENS
at which the president is not present. For many Americans, the
light refuses to turn on.
In Nazi Germany did no one but Jews have anything to fear from
the Gestapo?
By Stalin's time Lenin and Trotsky had eliminated all members of
the "oppressor class," but that did not stop Stalin from sending
millions of "enemies of the people" to the Gulag.
It is extremely difficult to hold even local police forces
accountable. Who is going to hold accountable a federal police
protected by Homeland Security and the president?
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in
the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall
Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of
National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good
Intentions.He can be reached at:
pcroberts@postmark.net
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