The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is, like most advocacy groups, more than a bit over-zealous in defending its ideological position. Its analysis of the USA PATRIOT Act, though, is both insightful and disturbing.
The civil liberties of ordinary Americans have taken a tremendous blow with this law, especially the right to privacy in our online communications and activities. Yet there is no evidence that our previous civil liberties posed a barrier to the effective tracking or prosecution of terrorists. In fact, in asking for these broad new powers, the government made no showing that the previous powers of law enforcement and intelligence agencies to spy on US citizens were insufficient to allow them to investigate and prosecute acts of terrorism. The process leading to the passage of the bill did little to ease these concerns. To the contrary, they are amplified by the inclusion of so many provisions that, instead of aimed at terrorism, are aimed at nonviolent, domestic computer crime. In addition, although many of the provisions facially appear aimed at terrorism, the Government made no showing that the reasons they failed to detect the planning of the recent attacks or any other terrorist attacks were the civil liberties compromised with the passage of USAPA.
One can but hope that the inevitable abuses of the provisions of this bill are only awful enough to lead to those provisions being repealed.
(Via Wil Wheaton)