NOYB wrote:


Someone stole my wife's ID and credit card info recently.

Yikes! That sucks. Sorry to hear about it.


I did a little more probing around and found that (thanks to the Patriot
Act) it's actually the Secret Service's Electronic Crime Task Force that
handles investigations into internet crimes.
Having gone through all of this, I realized that without the Patriot Act,
there'd be no agency with the authority, know-how, or interest to even
pursue a case like this. No wonder internet crime had become so
popular...and had become a preferred method of communication and revenue
generation by the terrorists.

I've seen the Patriot Act work in my favor...but have yet to see it work
against me or any other law-abiding citizen that I know.


But it wasn't the unPatriotic Act that provided help...it was the Secret
Service.

We had a couple of really nasty crank calls some years ago, two serious
enough to contact the local police, who put us in direct contact with
the FBI. They took care of the perps in a satisfactory fashion. One of
the perps no longer posts here, at least not under the handle he had
used in rec.boats.

This was before the unPatriotic Act.

Apparently the local police up here are a little more "with it."





--
We today have a president of the United States who looks like he is the
son of Howdy Doody or Alfred E. Newman, who isn't smarter than either of
them, who is arrogant about his ignorance, who is reckless and
incompetent, and whose backers are turning the United States into a pariah.

What, me worry?

I've seen the Patriot Act work in my favor...but have yet to see it work
against me or any other law-abiding citizen that I know.



When you see it work against you, it will be too late to do anything about it.

It's one thing to use these powers on "terorists", but as you discovered first
hand
the law enforcement agencies are all too quick to use these powers to usurp the
constitutional rights of others suspected of
non-terror offenses as well.

Everybody agrees that we should crack down on "Terrorists".

Our founding fathers, for good or ill, created some specific guidelines we must
observe when pursuing common criminals.
Their intent was to prevent fraudlent or groundless prosecution based on
political preferance or personal ambition- as can be more common in a monarchy.

I struggle to think of a government, anywhere in history, that had the sweeping
powers available to it that the Patriot Act bestows on the the US government
and that did not, ultimately, direct those powers against its political, as
well as criminal, opponents.

"Harry Krause" wrote in message
...
NOYB wrote:


Someone stole my wife's ID and credit card info recently.

Yikes! That sucks. Sorry to hear about it.


I did a little more probing around and found that (thanks to the Patriot
Act) it's actually the Secret Service's Electronic Crime Task Force that
handles investigations into internet crimes.
Having gone through all of this, I realized that without the Patriot
Act,
there'd be no agency with the authority, know-how, or interest to even
pursue a case like this. No wonder internet crime had become so
popular...and had become a preferred method of communication and revenue
generation by the terrorists.

I've seen the Patriot Act work in my favor...but have yet to see it work
against me or any other law-abiding citizen that I know.


But it wasn't the unPatriotic Act that provided help...it was the Secret
Service.


The Patriot Act gave to the USSS the authority and responsibility to
investigate internet crimes. Prior to that, nobody was sure *who* was
responsible and had jurisdiction.


We had a couple of really nasty crank calls some years ago, two serious
enough to contact the local police, who put us in direct contact with
the FBI. They took care of the perps in a satisfactory fashion. One of
the perps no longer posts here, at least not under the handle he had
used in rec.boats.

This was before the unPatriotic Act.

Apparently the local police up here are a little more "with it."

It wasn't the phone calls that the agent was most interested in. If it was
merely phone threats, I suspect that the FBI would have been the
organization to contact. However, it was the fact that the thief used the
internet to commit identity theft, credit card fraud, and the sale of stolen
merchandise...and was doing this on an international scale. I called the
local FBI office and they said an agent would call back, which he never did.
I never followed up with them because I spoke with the USSS agent
immediately after leaving a message at the FBI's office.

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
I've seen the Patriot Act work in my favor...but have yet to see it work
against me or any other law-abiding citizen that I know.



When you see it work against you, it will be too late to do anything about
it.

It's one thing to use these powers on "terorists", but as you discovered
first
hand
the law enforcement agencies are all too quick to use these powers to
usurp the
constitutional rights of others suspected of
non-terror offenses as well.

The thief was selling goods purchased illegally in Romania, the Netherlands,
Great Britain, an elsewhere. How do you know that it isn't a
money-producing scheme used to fund terrorism?

The thief was selling goods purchased illegally in Romania, the Netherlands,
Great Britain, an elsewhere. How do you know that it isn't a
money-producing scheme used to fund terrorism?

Thank you for making my point.

Under the Patriot Act, there is no need to establish any link to terrorism,
merely to claim that one exists.

Take search warrants, for instance. Under the Patriot Act, no judge can refuse
to grant a search warrant if the law enforcement agency mentions the word
"terrorist" anywhere in the application for such a warrant. Under the patriot
act, an initially issued search warrant can be used over, and over, and over,
and over again if the police believe the search "could be" related to an
existing investigation that "could be" related to terrorism.

The Patriot Act effectively guts the constitutional protection against illegal
search and seizure. But I guess that's OK, Bush and Ashcroft have decided we
didn't need that portion of the Bill of Rights, anyway.

Gould 0738 wrote:
The thief was selling goods purchased illegally in Romania, the Netherlands,
Great Britain, an elsewhere. How do you know that it isn't a
money-producing scheme used to fund terrorism?

Thank you for making my point.

Under the Patriot Act, there is no need to establish any link to terrorism,
merely to claim that one exists.

Take search warrants, for instance. Under the Patriot Act, no judge can refuse
to grant a search warrant if the law enforcement agency mentions the word
"terrorist" anywhere in the application for such a warrant. Under the patriot
act, an initially issued search warrant can be used over, and over, and over,
and over again if the police believe the search "could be" related to an
existing investigation that "could be" related to terrorism.

The Patriot Act effectively guts the constitutional protection against illegal
search and seizure. But I guess that's OK, Bush and Ashcroft have decided we
didn't need that portion of the Bill of Rights, anyway.


Righties see the entire Bill of Rights as an encumbrance, not as the
defensive wall between the government and the citizen. In fact, righties
misinterpret the only two elements of the Bill of Rights they "believe
in," their belief that they can own whatever weapons they want, and
their belief they can shove their form of Christianity down the throats
of everyone else.

In the days not so long ago when Conservatism actually had moral and
intellectual underpinnings, such was not the case.



--
We today have a president of the United States who looks like he is the
son of Howdy Doody or Alfred E. Newman, who isn't smarter than either of
them, who is arrogant about his ignorance, who is reckless and
incompetent, and whose backers are turning the United States into a pariah.

What, me worry?

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
The thief was selling goods purchased illegally in Romania, the
Netherlands,
Great Britain, an elsewhere. How do you know that it isn't a
money-producing scheme used to fund terrorism?

Thank you for making my point.

Under the Patriot Act, there is no need to establish any link to
terrorism,
merely to claim that one exists.

Take search warrants, for instance. Under the Patriot Act, no judge can
refuse
to grant a search warrant if the law enforcement agency mentions the word
"terrorist" anywhere in the application for such a warrant. Under the
patriot
act, an initially issued search warrant can be used over, and over, and
over,
and over again if the police believe the search "could be" related to an
existing investigation that "could be" related to terrorism.

The Patriot Act effectively guts the constitutional protection against
illegal
search and seizure. But I guess that's OK, Bush and Ashcroft have decided
we
didn't need that portion of the Bill of Rights, anyway.

Chuck,
You've effectively managed to change the point of my whole story. Now it's
time to bring you back to reality. The person who stole my wife's credit
card number is using a valid AOL email account to commit his crimes. This
isn't an issue of "protecting the innocent". He/she is guilty. He/she is
continuing to commit the crimes using the AOL account. If the account was
fraudulently created, then the subpoena will at least allow the Feds to shut
it down. If it's legit, then the thief goes to jail. It's a matter of
finally having some legislation that grants law enforcement the power to
pursue criminals that historically have operated outside the reach of
traditional law enforcement methods.

Chuck,
You've effectively managed to change the point of my whole story.

Huh? You summed up your story with a comment about how wonderful it was that
the Patriot Act was being used as a domestic law enforcement device.

Why not just remove all the restrictions from the police? Give them unlimited
discretion to behave any way they want.
Why should we burden them with silly ideas that evidence needs to meet any sort
of standards? Let's just go to "guilty until proven innocent", that should make
the court system run a lot more efficiently.

Chuck,
You've effectively managed to change the point of my whole story.


Gould 0738 wrote:
Huh? You summed up your story with a comment about how wonderful it was that
the Patriot Act was being used as a domestic law enforcement device.

I thought the whole point of NOBBY's story is that 1- he's a weenie who
cannot simply go and break the thief's kneecap... 2- he is really
longing for a tyrannical dictatorship instead of a constitutional democracy.


Why not just remove all the restrictions from the police? Give them unlimited
discretion to behave any way they want.

Well, in reality, that's the case and always must be. Police officers,
marshalls, gov't enforcement agents, etc etc, all can pretty much act as
they please. They have guns, they have authority, they can order people
around.... BUT our system has a set of checks & balances that reward
them for acting responsibly & in the public interest (much of the time)
and punishes them for acting tyrannically (much of the time).

Much of the Patriot Act is about removing those checks & balances. Is
this a good idea?

Why should we burden them with silly ideas that evidence needs to meet any sort
of standards? Let's just go to "guilty until proven innocent", that should make
the court system run a lot more efficiently.

Let's get rid of the courts. Just let the cops beat the snot out of
anybody they think is a criminal or might become one. In fact, let's
take people rumored to be terrorists and/or criminals and do something
really cruel to them, like cut their hands off... maybe we could tie
them to a post and get everybody in town to throw rocks at them...

DSK