
Patriot Act author warns EU against dragnet response to terror - JumpCrisscross
http://www.politico.eu/article/us-senator-warns-eu-against-dragnet-response-to-terror/
======
mkaziz
In my mind, the erosion of privacy and freedom - some of the most vaunted
principles of the West - is the ultimate triumph of terrorist organizations
like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. They can't beat us by strength of arms, so instead
they're stunting our culture.

~~~
DougWebb
There was an article posted here a few weeks ago, written by a man who was
held captive by ISIS for a long time. He said that he learned their ultimate
goal has nothing to do with our culture or freedom. They believe armageddon is
coming, that it is literaly going to be a big battle in a particular town in
Syria near the Turkish border, and that the West is the enemy (descendants of
the Roman empire) that their Moslem army must defeat. The terrorist acts are
intended to force this battle to commence, which they are confident they will
win.

If they really believe this, I'm stunned at how oblivious they are. If an all-
out battle really took place, they wouldn't face an army. They'd face an
airforce that'd be a lot more aggressive than the one they're currently
facing. The US and Russia could turn Syria into a sheet of radioactive glass
if they wanted to / had to in order to "win armageddon". The only reason ISIS
is able to continue to exist is because of our tolerance and compassion.

~~~
mkaziz
I didn't read the article, but my gut instinct would be that the people this
man was held captive by were foot soldiers. They are frequently illiterate
people who are fed such "prophecies" as truth.

I do contend with your statement about ISIS continuing to exist because of
western compassion. If the West had the means to destroy them (without harming
millions of innocent civilians), the compassionate thing to do would be to do
it ASAP.

~~~
tremon
> If the West had the means to destroy them (without harming millions of
> innocent civilians)

When the GP speaks of compassion, I think (s)he is referring to the millions
of civilians there, not the fighters.

~~~
DougWebb
Yes, that's exactly what I meant. The cold-hearted decision would be to count
those civilians as acceptable losses, and just carpet-bomb the whole area.

------
Retric
The real problem is flagging 0.2% of the population is useless when 0.00001%
of the population is terrorists. If everything works perfectly your people end
up investigating 1,000 innocent people in a row which trains them that
everything is a false positive.

The 9/11 hijackers and the Boston marathon bombers where both flagged yet the
attacks still happened in large part because there was simply far to much
noise from other people and not enough signal.

~~~
acqq
> The 9/11 hijackers and the Boston marathon bombers where both flagged yet
> the attacks still happened because there was simply far to much noise and
> not enough signal.

I've never read that this was a typical "noise":

"NBC News said the Russian intelligence agency FSB cabled the FBI about its
concerns in March 2011, warning that Tsarnaev was known to have associated
with militant Islamists."

[http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-explosions-boston-
cong...](http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-explosions-boston-congress-
idUSBREA2P02Q20140326#KLiMs6ZeKSVHdwtB.97)

~~~
mtgx
I think he meant it in the sense that "we have 10,000 other people who are
_associated with militant Islamits_ in our database, why should we care about
these guys?"

That's the noise he's talking about. The reason you can't "prevent" terrorism,
is because there are way too many people who "act a certain way", whatever
that way may be. This isn't helped by the fact that agencies like TSA and
whatnot have huge lists or vague descriptions of what describes "suspicious
behavior" that pretty much cover _everyone_ who goes through the airport.

[https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20141024/14222128933/guide...](https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20141024/14222128933/guidelines-
who-might-be-suspicious-too-nervous-too-calm-blending-standing-out-its-all-
suspcious.shtml)

That's _noise_. You're giving these agents exponentially more factors to
consider that makes it impossible for them to find the _real terrorist_. It
really is "making the haystack bigger" (as a counter-argument to NSA's opinion
that mass surveillance helps them "find the needle in the haystack").

~~~
acqq
> "we have 10,000 other people who are associated with militant Islamits in
> our database

"And for who even Russians spent their energy to notify us"?

I'd expect that most of the 10,000 others aren't on the list because Russians
notify the FBI. Or you know more than I do, and I'd be glad to learn.

Or maybe the warning was ignored because of the Tsarnaev's uncle?

[http://backchannel.al-
monitor.com/index.php/2013/04/5090/for...](http://backchannel.al-
monitor.com/index.php/2013/04/5090/former-cia-officer-absurd-to-link-uncle-of-
boston-suspects-agency-over-daughters-brief-marriage/)

Interestingly, the "Terrorist Watch List" reached 1 million in 2009:

[http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-03-10-wa...](http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-03-10-watchlist_N.htm)

It seems your estimate was two orders of magnitude off.

~~~
barrkel
_Interestingly, the "Terrorist Watch List" reached 1 million in 2009: [...] It
seems your estimate was two orders of magnitude off._

This doesn't strengthen your assertions.

~~~
jacquesm
And technically we're _all_ on the 'terrorist watch list' since we're all
being watched. Just on the off chance we convert into a terrorist I guess.

~~~
acqq
Well the article quotes the given number for the list with the given name, so
we're technically all on some other list with some other name. But 1 from
every 300 US inhabitants is on that specific list.

------
jacquesm
“Talking about it in practical terms, the answer is to target the people which
you know are up to bad stuff rather than bringing in the 99.8 percent of the
inhabitants there, including the vast majority of followers of Islam, who have
no intention whatsoever of conducting a terrorist attack,”

Are there any other terms than 'practical'?

Better late than never I guess. What's funny is that this was not exactly new
knowledge when the patriot act was drafted in the first place. All these
idiotically named acts ('patriot act', 'freedom act') are named that way so
that if you're against them it looks as if you're either not a patriot or
against freedom.

~~~
TinyRick
>>All these idiotically named acts ('patriot act', 'freedom act') are named
that way so that if you're against them it looks as if you're either not a
patriot or against freedom.

I believe the names of these acts are acronyms:

USA Freedom Act [0] = Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights
and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-collection and Online Monitoring Act

USA Patriot Act [1] = Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing
Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_Freedom_Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_Freedom_Act)
[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act)

~~~
jacquesm
Yes, but you can bet the acronyms were thought of before they named the act.
Or do you really believe those acronyms spell 'PATRIOT' and 'FREEDOM' by
chance?

See also the 'Supreme Head of Intelligence Targeting'.

------
exabrial
After watching this country erode away 1st and 2nd amendment rights with "save
the children" arguments, I'm surprised to see people surprised, when they see
their 4th amendment rights eroded in the same ways they authorized their 1st
and 2nd ones to infringed on.

------
csandreasen
Jim Sensenbrenner is the last person who should be lecturing on dragnet
surveillance. He was one of the writers of the PATRIOT Act, then failed to
attend any classified briefings where the NSA explained what they were doing
with the phone records program. He later went on to admit that he didn't
attend them because didn't want to have to deal with the burden of handling
classified information[2]. He had at least six opportunities to hear exactly
what was going on, voice his dissent and put forth legislation to curtail it.
Instead he put the laws into place then shirked his duty to provide any
oversight, somehow proud of the fact that he was legislating from a position
of willful ignorance. That kind of behavior is exactly what the EU should be
warned about.

[1] [http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/patriot-act-architect-cries-
foul-...](http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/patriot-act-architect-cries-foul-nsa-
progr)

[2] [https://www.lawfareblog.com/shameless-revisionism-james-
sens...](https://www.lawfareblog.com/shameless-revisionism-james-
sensenbrenner-georgetown-law-center-edition)

------
dceddia
From the article: "In France, the current state of emergency, which lawmakers
quickly agreed to extend for three months, allows authorities to raid homes
without warrants. The country’s interior minister said Wednesday that since
November 13, French authorities have conducted 2,235 searches and arrested 263
people."

------
gohrt
Did Sensenbrenner really believe that the PATRIOT act was a good idea at the
time? I can't understand how that's possible. It was known from the start to
be a horrid power grab.

The only explanation I can comprehend is that he know how deceptive and
abusive the law was, buy he promoted when a Republican was president, and he
doesn't like it now that Democrat is in power.

------
sukulaku
What a silly article.

>> _A lead author of the U.S. Patriot Act has some advice for European
officials as they wrestle with the balance between personal liberties and
security in the wake of the Paris terror attacks_

That implies that security _is actually achieved_ through a reduction in
liberties, which is obviously not the case.

For example, monitoring the shit out of the general population didn't seem to
help prevent the recent spate of shootings in the US.

>> _He notes that at the time, a broad range of lawmakers, from security hawks
to civil libertarians, voted for the bill_

What's a "security hawk"? In light of the developments in the past few years,
wouldn't it be more accurate to call them " _tyranny_ hawks"? That would sound
kind of unpleasant though.

>> _The USA Freedom Act was signed into law in June, and government’s
authority for bulk data collection ended this week_

But let's not mention that in reality, the legislation did nothing to curtail
the surveillance. It's unconstitutional to begin with, so why would any other
law be an impediment?

>> _Among other things, the prime minister proposed allowing authorities to
hold suspects for 72 hours without a warrant and tag extremist young people
with electronic tethers. “We must always preserve the balance between safety,
freedom and privacy of citizens,” he said._

Extremist young people, you say? Here's the UK government's helpful advisory
on what that might entail: [http://www.cscb-new.co.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2015/10/CSCB_Ra...](http://www.cscb-new.co.uk/wp-
content/uploads/2015/10/CSCB_Radicalisation_and_Extremism_Single_Pages.pdf)

>> _" Showing a mistrust of mainstream media reports and belief in conspiracy
theories"_ [..] _" Appearing angry about government policies, especially
foreign policy."_

So I guess if you're 'mistrustful' of the US government telling you the
economy is doing fine, that makes you an "extremist" that should be "tagged
with an electronic tether", whatever that might be.

You shouldn't question foreign policy either. For example, clearly the US has
done a wonderful job of fighting ISIS, right? To suggest otherwise would be
heresy! Don't complain about meddling in other countries' affairs either, or
you might find yourself "tagged with an electronic tether"!

Everything in "The Free World" is just doubleplusgood all around.

