Missouri Enacts Facebook Patriot Act

The top story in the St. Louis area right now is the suspension of a professional baseball player.  A law passed by the Missouri Senate in July which is about to go into effect limiting contact between teachers and students via social networks is perhaps a distant second.
 
State Senator Jane Cunningham (R-Nanny State) authored the “Amy Hestir Student Protection Act,” which aims to prohibit private communication between teachers and students.  Some reports have stated that it prevents students from being “friends” with teachers on social networking sites like Facebook.  Senator Cunningham claims the law does no such thing and that it only prohibits conversations that can be seen only by the teacher and the student.  In other words, students and teachers can correspond on each other’s Facebook wall, but not through Facebook’s messaging service unless it is copied to a parent. 

It doesn’t take much to see what’s wrong with this picture besides the blatant violation of privacy. 

The objective is obviously meant to protect students from teachers who might be sexual predators, but Cunningham’s busybody legislation completely misses the mark.  It presumes teachers are guilty until proven innocent. 

Warrantless GPS Tracking On Trial

Despite the unfortunate reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act by Congress last month, provisions of the law, especially with regards to warrantless searches, are being challenged in the courts. This week, the Supreme Court is going to weigh in on the constitutionality of bugging somebody's car with a GPS tracking device without a proper search warrant, which some believe is a flagrant violation of the 4th Amendment.

The case in question revolves around Antoine Jones, who was convicted in 2008 for possession and distribution of cocaine. Mr. Jones' argument is that the evidence presented in his trial was illegally gotten from a GPS tracking device secretly mounted on his Jeep for a month leading up to his arrest. Therefore, the evidence cannot be considered admissible because it was acquired without a search warrant being filed.

Last year, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled in Mr. Jones' favor, stating that the tracking is a violation of the 4th amendment, yet the government maintains that the warrantless GPS tracking is in compliance with previous court rulings regarding searches. As the case goes before the Supreme Court, civil rights groups like the ACLU and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) have filed amicus briefs, claiming the new modern tracking style is "highly intrusive" and needs to be restrained.  More at www.silverunderground.com.

Paul vs. Reid: An Epic Battle Over the PATRIOT Act

This week, the Senate floor was witness to a back-and-forth skirmish of political maneuvering and parliamentary gamesmanship between Senator Rand Paul and Senator Harry Reid over the reauthorization of the misnamed, unconstitutional PATRIOT Act.

In the end, Sen. Paul was only successful at getting a debate and a vote on two of the amendments he had proposed to the tyrannical legislation, despite Sen. Reid's promises that there would be a week of debate and an open amendment process, but Sen. Paul's efforts to push the issue as far as he could were valiant and admirable nonetheless.

We've put together a timeline of the blow-by-blow of how it all went down below.  But first, some relevant videos:

End the PATRIOT Act

Members of Congress are once again proving just how much they despise American liberty. This week, both the Senate and the House with make critical votes on whether to extend certain freedom squelching provisions of the PATRIOT Act before its expiration date this Friday.

Last week, it was reported that Speaker of the House John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid struck a so-called “backroom” deal that would essentially keep the PATRIOT Act alive for another four years. Despite failing to secure a long term renewal of the act earlier this year, instead only passing a brief 90 day extension, Congressional lawmakers seem determined to stay clear of the limited government mandate that so many Americans sought during last years' elections.

The main provisions of the PATRIOT Act that are set to expire on May 27 , 2011 include some of the worst attacks on the fourth amendment in US history. As Bruce Fein made clear in his statement before the House Judiciary Committee on behalf of the Campaign for Liberty during a May 11 hearing on the PATRIOT Act:

Section 206 of the Patriot Act authorizing roving wiretaps to collect foreign intelligence; section 215 authorizing orders to seize any "tangible thing" like books or computer hard drives to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities; section 505 authorizing National Security Letters to seize customer records of financial institutions, credit bureaus, and telecommunications providers by the government's assertion of relevance to preventing international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities;