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L. Neil Smith's THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE Number 200, November 25, 2002 BICENTENNIAL!
Welcome to the Police State: Now Shut Up and Do As You're Told
Special to TLE How can anyone doubt it anymore? -- Federal checkpoints in downtown Detroit. -- A secret appellate review courts determines that an acknowledged violation of the Bill of Rights is legally acceptable. -- USA PATRIOT. -- Official acknowledgment that the feds have created a list of people - not accused of crimes - who are not allowed to fly. Another list - again, of people not accused of a crime - to be singled out for harassment if they're foolish enough to try flying. -- The Pentagon's Information Awareness Office and , in turn, its Total Information Awareness data-miner, meant to snoop on citizens not accused of crimes. -- No-warrant placement of keystroke bugs on suspects' computers. -- Public strip searches in airports, with dissenters arrested and sentenced to public humiliation. -- Secret military trials for US citizens. -- Hundreds of people arrested, and held incommunicado in secret, without criminal charges. -- Congress abdicates its responsibility to control the declaration of war. -- The President issues a continuous stream of lies to justify a war. -- The FBI creates an national climate of fear by releasing vague, baseless warnings of eminent attacks by nameless, invisible foes. -- Secret fishing expeditions in libraries by the FBI, to see if anyone is reading unapproved books. -- Republican declarations of a "mandate" from the people, when little more than a third of those _allowed_ to vote even did so. -- The US Attorney General accuses his critics of terrorism. -- A high-level DOD official declares that freedom is not a right. -- The TSA prepares rules for internal travel documents. -- The Supreme Court rules that there is no right to privacy. -- Congress considers bills to require identity papers for all citizens. -- Cell phones are required to incorporate tracking devices. -- Telephone companies are required to install equipment that allows remote tapping of all telephones in the country by the feds. -- DCS1000/Carnivore. -- Police patrol the streets in battle gear. -- Congress considers new legislation to put federal military troops on the streets. -- The President signs yet another order declaring a national emergency. -- TIPS gets a new lease on life in the Homeland Security bill, and New York implements a state version. -- Anonymous informer hotlines, violating the Sixth Amendment, are the norm in "law enforcement." Welcome to the police state; now shut up and do as you're told, tovarisch.
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