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Think about this
The ones that this act actually affects, the ones that have had their civil rights violated...they can't exactly post here...warranted or unwarranted violations. They could be sitting under the prison somewhere held up to 6 months w/out formal charges being brought about, and can be renewed indefinitely..ie, they could be held in prison indefinitely..period..without a trial, without even having charges brought up. Imagine, you're at your computer typing away, knock knock, "you're suspected of something, come with us" and bammo, you're under the prison waiting...
the patriot act allows that.
Imagine, you're working on a dissertation about the middle east that you've been working on since 1997. You have research materials, etc, but you need something from the library of congress, so you go ask about so and so from 1933, who happens to be related to a known terrorist today, say a cousin of some form...and you're detained for several hours under questioning about why you're doing research on the middle east, who you're researching, why, what outcome, etc, and they leave you by saying they'll be watching....(this happened to a friend of mine at columbia university)
it's a scary act, no wonder there was a spontaneous applause eruption when bush said provisions expired next year...
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Live.
Chris
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