When all you have to talk about is a fantasy world, it becomes far too
easy to create an issue out of nothing. I contend that is what certain
members of the U.S. Congress are about lately.
Here is an example. The FBI's use of the patriot act is brought
into
question. The DoJ Inspector General goes looking and yes, there
are some foul-ups.
Some big, most small, but all bureaucratic screw ups. The DoJ IG
reports "no
criminal misconduct". Congress, however, seizes on this as
evidence
that a) the Patriot Act is horribly flawed, b) the FBI is horribly
flawed, and c) the Attorney General of the United States must resign,
because he too, is horribly flawed.
What a load of B.S.
Fact: At issue are what
are
known as Security Letters -- they exists as a shortcut to a
surveillance warrant and are supposed to be used in emergency
situations where the opportunity to catch a suspect doing their
nefarious thing is fleeting and may be missed by waiting for a warrant
to be issued.
Fact: In EVERY
case, there
are responsible professional law enforcement and anti-terrorist agents
requesting and being granted the security letters.
Fact: 140,000+ security
letters were used by the
FBI in a five year period since the Patriot Act was made into
law. Do
the math. That is, on the average, less than 50,000 letters per
year.
If you assume those were each used to obtain investigative information
on one individual per letter, then let's look at what percentage of the
population is effected by the use of security letters.
Fact: The U.S.
population in 2006 (Tuesday October 17, 2006 to be exact 1) just
surpassed 300 million people and grows at about 4 million
new babies per year, and a whopping 1 million by illegal
immigration.
Later, I'd like to talk about that...1/4 of our new population every
year come here both illegally and in many cases unwanted (criminal or
terrorist element amongst illegal aliens).
So let's assume zero growth and figure out what is the percentage of
people effected in the United States by security letter, if every
security letter was both valid and executed properly. The number
of people surveilled in that scenario
is
infinitesimal.
Fact: This means that
140,000 against 300 million were surveilled in a five year
period. That works out to all of .004 percent (.004%).
0.004 percent
of the people in the U.S. over five years had a security letter
generated to surveil them. That is .00092 percent per year
(0.00092%). Microscopic.
The problem with the Security Letter issue is that it is a not a
problem.
First, of the math produces
numbers that are so low as to only effect 4.6 in every 10,000
people over five years, and a very significant number of those aren't
even American
citizens. The process only effected 9.2 people per 100,000 per
year.
I certainly am glad that the FBI was looking at 10 people out of every
100,000 every year. To do otherwise would be a horrible failure
to do their sworn duty!!!!
Second, the FBI has NOT been shown to be going after
political dissidents, Democrats as a population, and especially not
innocent moms and pops. The FBI has been looking at people
suspected of
terrorism or major money laundering crimes that may contribute to
terrorism.
Third, the IG report from the DoJ is not at all clear how many
Security Letters were actually invalid or the process was
misused. The data just isn't there. Is it one quarter of
the letters, one third or even one half? Take one half and be
generous. That means that 4.6 people in 100,000 might have had
the FBI surveilling them due to an invalid letter. That doesn't
mean the FBI was "after them" or even all that interested. Of the
140,000 people in five years, many were found to be not worth pursing
investigation on. That data is also missing from the DoJ
report. It could easily be said that of the 140,000, ten minutes
of surveillance meant the FBI pulled nearly all the surveillance in
disgust --
another waste of time.
It's not like the local FBI office is going after a soccer
mom for speeding on the freeway. No, these are our law
enforcement
professionals, who may be helping Homeland Security in finding illegals
who are connected to a Latin American drug gang, using identity theft
to get jobs in the U.S. and in some cases at military bases or
airports, ports or other sensitive areas. This is not the FBI agent
looking into his girlfriend's other boyfriend's activities.
The people of interest are people whose
actions have created probable cause. Sending money to Pakistan,
purchasing night vision goggles and bulletproof vests and then using
the telephone or email to arrange their sale to a terrorist
organization in the U.S. or overseas. These are not even petty
criminals in the U.S. who have run afoul of the FBI. The "least"
offense is most likely to be smuggling cigarettes across state lines
and using the profit "earned" as payments to terrorist organizations
overseas like Hamas or Hezbollah. Or the money being sent "home"
to Pakistan
where it fuels a range of Jihadists that would make your head
spin. And even then, they probably found no evidence to continue
surveilling.
What the Democrats and liberatarians are not saying is that every one
of the security letters met a very high standard of probable
cause. Even in the smallest FBI office, a supervising agent would
have to have sufficient probable cause to even request such a
letter. And this is not about a cop looking at a driver weaving
down the street, we're talking about major crimes or terrorism
here. The left wants you to think that every miscreant in the
U.S. is being surveilled by the over zealous FBI for less than probable
cause. None of that is true, and is so far from the truth, the
very idea becomes a lie in-of-itself.
The problem that the Democrats have with this is that in the effort to
conduct the war on terror, the government may have screwed up and not
sent follow up paperwork to an Internet Service Provider, or that a
local FBI region used their judgment and decided it was worthwhile to
surveil someone whose activities may have been innocent. So
what?
The whole idea behind probable cause and investigation is to
investigate! You make the judgment, you go look, and if you find
nothing to pursue, you swear at the wasted time and move on. Of
140,000+ security letters in five years, I am damned sure that happened
a lot. That is how you find the 100 in 140,000 potential
terrorists in our country. That is how you manage to prevent
major
terrorist events in the U.S. following 9/11. In other words, that
is
how you protect this country. You have to look to
find. And you invariably -- always -- wind up looking at
innocents in your effort to find the bad guys. The only way NOT
to look at innocents, is not to look at all. That is unacceptable.
The whole idea about privacy and probable cause is to prevent
unscrupulous, malevolent surveillance of the innocent. To prevent
use
of the law enforcement agencies to further a political agenda or lean
on dissidents. Yet, that is exactly what the Democratic Congress
is
now doing. They are leaning on the FBI for doing their job (the
FBI is
doing quite well if results are to be the benchmark) and trivializing
about over sensitivity to privacy issues and using the fine work by the
FBI as a
political tool against the executive branch. There is no
evidence, no
trace of suspicion except in the Democrat paranoid mindset of any
misuse of the FBI to lurk in the shadows and seek out the left.
On the
contrary, the FBI has been effective. Not fabulously so, and
perhaps
human error and eagerness to get the job done has meant they were a
little quick to peek at people who got their attention. What kind
of
data are we talking about anyway?
The same data that every credit card company has for every U.S.
citizen. It's not like they sucked out your daily thoughts,
peeked
into your living room, or bedroom. The FBI got such sensitive
information as your name, social security number, phone number,
address, IP address, how often you logged onto the ISP to look at the
Internet. Then, and only then, did they use that information to
look
further and ONLY if there was even more probable cause. In most
cases, a quick look at the addresses of your emails or the phone
numbers calling into or out of your phone made it clear you were not
engaged in businesss with a known terrorist or terrorist
organization. End of story.
What the left is worried about is that some of those surveilled may
have been Muslims. Duh? That is bound to happen when EVERY
one of the Islamist Extremists that threaten this country is a
Muslim. That does not mean some sort of pogram against Muslims,
it is the reverse. The over sensitive, nut case libertarian mind
cannot distinguish between being a Muslim and being an Islamic
Extremist. However, fortunately for our country, the FBI can and
does distinguish between the two quite handily.
That is where the Democrats get all tipsy with annoyance. Maybe
the
FBI watched as you or one of your children downloaded a nasty little
picture. Perhaps they watched as you wrote a letter to your
sister and
complained about the conditions at work. That is what the
Democrats and libertarian
want you to believe.
The Democrats believe that every Muslim who was found to be conducting
activities that are supporting terrorism is just an innocent ice cream
vendor or a misguided son taking Jihadist lessons for the fun of
it. These poor, misunderstood families who have done nothing
wrong. And you were grouped among them, you were being surveilled
along with these folk.
When, the truth be known, the FBI weren't
watching you at all. Nor were they watching anyone you know
personally.
The FBI was watching someone who had gotten their attention
in some other way. Like mailing a bulletproof vest that a CIA
operative in Pakistan noticed and tipped them off to a possible weapons
export problem. Or perhaps the person the FBI is watching was
caught leaving the U.S. with a
wad of money that would eventually wind up in the hands of some
Jihadist in the Middle East. Not the local falaful vendor
or the ice cream vendor. Not unless they attracted the attention of the
FBI.
Perhaps the person being watched was using their free
speech rights to tell Muslim students to kill Americans and Jews
because they were pigs. That is what concerns the Democrats and
libertarians. That edgy gray area between the right to free
speech
and sedition, treason and terrorism. The folks at the FBI are not
the political police. They aren't the local church group
interested in the images sitting on your computer, or a business
competitor interested in your finances. Fortuntely, however, if
the FBI is tipped to someone stockpiling weapons and training to kill
Nancy Pelosi or George Bush, they get on the case right away.
You know, I say a lot of bad
things about Congress. I simply hate the people that sometimes
"grace"
the halls of that institution, but not the institution itself. I
could be labeled seditious, one supposes, simply because I rant against
some of the people
in Congress. And if the FBI decided to "listen in" on my emails
what
would they see? A few notes a week from people overseas who don't
like
what they are seeing where they live. Maybe a few open source
professionals hinting to
me that I might look in a particular area for intresting tidbits.
Or perhaps a
very unhappy soldier or two who is asking "What do they think they are
doing in Congress? Do they not understand that their words are
being
used to incite more anti Americanism? Don't they know that their
actions are contributing to the enemy's welfare? What is wrong
with
our Congress?" Do I mind that the FBI might investigate me?
Of course
not. I have nothing to hide and under my scenario here, had
probable
cause. They look, they see nothing untoward, and go look
elsewhere.
The problem comes in when THEY look and see something THEY don't
like. It's this "THEY" thing.
Not because what THEY see is illegal or edgy, but simply something not
to THEIR liking. For instance, let's suppose the FBI, the big
THEY in the conspiracy theorist's mind, were working for Nancy
Pelosi. THEY would not like some of my email exchanges that talk
about
her in not too flattering ways. If that were to get back to
powerful
Nancy Pelosi via the FBI, then there you have the misuse.
The Democrats and civil libertarians want you to believe that there is
a THEM out there looking over your shoulder like Big
Brother. The Democrats want you to believe THEY (the FBI)
are running around on a personal vendetta against the Democrats.
Unfortunately for the Democrat paranoia, there is no such evidence of
any such
occurrence. NONE. The FBI's security letters were being
used to investigate
major crimes or threats to the U.S., not some personal opinion about a
political hack. The Democrats and civil libertarians want you to
believe that the FBI is being used as a tool by George Bush to
eavesdrop on the left for nefarious purposes. To listen in on
your private conversations simply because they are the government and
they CAN. And as I indicated earlier, it wasn't you and there was
NEVER any flow of political dirt to George Bush. I doubt anyone
reading this opinion piece was ever looked at by the FBI in their
entire life and few if any names of those reading have ever been read
by George Bush or anyone in the Executive Branch. Maybe Bill O'Reilly,
Nancy Pelosi or you Dan Rather. But everyone else who visits
MILNET? No way.
There is no evidence of the FBI
providing information gleaned from their surveillance to anyone --
ANYONE -- who was not part of the investigative process. That
paranoia
only exists in the mind of the guilty, clinically paranoid, or those at
risk of personal
vendetta -- the Democrats perhaps?
My point is simple. This is a fantasy issue, one made up in order
to further the effort at Bush Bashing, all part of the 2008 election
campaign. The lefty Congress is playing politics with the FBI and
the Department of Justice -- the heinous crime that they are accusing
the Bush Administration of doing. So who is the real guilty
persons here?
Note: Of the possible scenarios I used to provide the FBI with
probable cause, all of them have been part of a known investigation
that resulted in the conviction of a terrorist. To my knowledge,
no soccer mom was arrested or ticketed due to an FBI security letter
enabled surveillance. An Ice Cream vendor's son was found guilty
of supporting terrorism and the father was convicted of immigration
violations both related to travel with large sums of money to Pakistan,
lieing to the FBI and other crimes one would expect in a terrorism
case. The only business men who have been convicted were
cigarette smugglers, exporters sending valuable military devices
overseas or purchasing stolen government machine guns or assault
rifles, or surface to air missiles. To my knowlege, no animals
were misused or harmed by the FBI or MILNET in any of these
investigations. And I do not contributte to global warming...I
hardly get out of the house except to buy groceries and I do not have
an SUV, and get about 23 miles per gallon. So sue me. Al
Gore uses 1000 times the electricity and fuel gas/oil than I do.
