Reply #47: They came first for the Communists ...

[spin]

They came first for the Communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

Pastor Martin Niemöller

This situation is a little different. So far it's our rights they are after.

November 12, 2010
Line Up to Give Up Your Rights
By Wesley Clark, MD

Airline travelers are now standing in security lines around the country for the opportunity to pose nude for the Department of Homeland Security. "Naked body scanners" are just the latest development in the field of Man-Caused Disaster prevention, a part of the Overseas Contingency Operations (War on Terror) in which the actions of a handful of suicidal terrorists, almost exclusively of a certain religious persuasion, have led to a massive government assault on the freedoms of all Americans. Since 9/11, the declared objective of al-Qaeda to destroy our society and our way of life has been implemented mainly by our own ruling class.

Stupefying amounts of our money -- hundreds of billions of dollars of our collective wealth -- continue to pour into the ever-expanding bureaucracy and government-run programs to listen to our phone calls, read our mail, collect our personal data, and particularly to intrusively inconvenience every citizen who travels by air. With each new, inexpensive, and creative exploit by al-Qaeda, the depth and breadth of invasive searches has progressively increased -- from emptying our pockets at first, confiscating nail files, then removing our shoes, our belts, wallets, jewelry, watches, confiscating toiletries, followed by random searches and pat-downs, and now nude body scans.

The Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution states:

The right of the people to be secure...against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.


Under the Patriot Act, our private communications may be eavesdropped on, and personal transactions can be secretly scrutinized with self-written warrants (National Security Letters written by a federal agent) that prohibit your banker, librarian, or others served from notifying you of the search (you can't even legally contest the warrant if you find out about it yourself, because if you complain to your lawyer or a court about it, you commit a felony by divulging that it exists). This act was originally justified by the War on Terror, but it has since been employed hundreds of thousands of times, often against innocent citizens swept up by innocent associations with alleged intelligence targets. The Obama administration is seeking to broaden the act still more.

TSA searches are now gutting the few remaining Fourth Amendment protections against search and seizure. Essentially, our government, supported by the courts, has defined a "Constitution-Free Zone" incorporating all airports and the area of the United States within one hundred miles of a border or the coast (termed the "functional equivalent of the
border, or extended border"), in which constitutional protections under the Fourth Amendment are deemed not applicable, and are routinely flouted by the Department of Homeland Security.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/11/line_up_to_give_up_your_rights.html