Calling For the Full Restoration of Our Rights - 25 Years Stolen From US

This is a call to action email sent to me by a friend, i xx'd out his name for the sake of his privacy - but i am compelled to post it because the necessity of having our rights fully restored (which has been stripped away for decades) is what is at issue here.


Dear friends and political allies,

Although one might smell a charade while checking out the vote tallies of the final roll call, yesterday's filibuster in the US Senate by nearly all of the Democrats and even some Republicans (including Sen Bill Frist ?) to stall ratification of the current version of the USA Patriot Act (H.R. 3199) provides the best political opportunity in years in the ongoing battle to restore and protect our Constitutional system and guaranteed civil rights.

The question is, how long will this opportunity last?


While Bush grimaced, sneered, and blustered today in defense of the Patriot Act and his secret "authorization" of illegal NSA surveillance of law abiding citizens, Senate Republicans were meeting privately during off hours over the weekend to devise a strategy to reverse the current political momentum in the country against certain provisions of the Patriot Act. No doubt they're planning to railroad another version through the Senate over the next few days or weeks but patriotic American citizens will probably be too distracted to pay attention, what with all of the holiday activities going on such as last-minute gift shopping, those huge after-Xmas sales, or shooting Craps and "going all in" at their favorite Indian casino.

Seriously, before those committed to making this country a police state are able to regain the polemic,
it's imperative we individually and vigorously lobby our Senators (and Representatives) to be unyielding in this fight against the Patriot Act until it's been 'shredded' on the floor of the House chamber. We may never have a political opportunity like this again.

But, we must not stop there. We must demand Congress work until the full restoration of our rights, including freedom of speech, the right to assemble, writ of habeas corpus, freedom from unreasonable search & seisure, freedom from cruel & unusual punishment, restore the full power of the FOIA, all of which have been trampled by the "anti-terrorism", "anti-drug" laws, and by dozens of Executive Orders passed in the name of "national security" during nearly 25 years of the Bush/Clinton/Bush administrations.

See ACLU http://action.aclu.org/reformthepatriotact/ and the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) http://www.fcnl.org/issues/issue.php?issue_id=68 for useful information about the Patriot Act.

Oh yeah. "Keep Hope Alive".

XXX XXXXXXXXX
Los Angeles

Capitol switchboard: (202) 224-3121
US Senate offices: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
US House of Representatives offices: http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml
Senate roll call on Patriot Act, 12-16-05: http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00358

:hi: