From the Dept. of Thoughtcrime...
Yes, that's right... everyone's favorite Big Brother bill of recent memory is slated to be expanded, not cut back like it was supposed to be as time passed. What started out as a law designed to give law enforcement and intelligence agencies a greater amount of leeway in pursuing terrorist activities, and has faced criticism as overstepping basic liberties and freedoms we've come to expect of America is now set to have a fairly scary addition tacked onto it.
Fun powers like the FBI being able to subpoena documents from companies without having to get a court order... or the fact that such subpoenas can not be disclosed, not even the fact that they exist if they're designated as "secret"
From the article on news.com:
But the proposal appears to grant the FBI more power to seek information from banks, hospitals, libraries, and so on through "administrative subpoenas" without prior judicial oversight. The subpoenas are only supposed to be used for terrorism or clandestine intelligence cases.
One other detail: the FBI may designate that the subpoenas are secret and punish disclosure of their existence with up to one year in prison (and five years if the disclosure is deemed to "obstruct an investigation.")
No specific details on the latest draft of the bill are available because the session in which the Intelligence Committee voted on these expansions was closed to the press and public. The best anyone has is a draft from a few months back.
Already the Patriot Act allows for law enforcement to make an end-run around court-approval for wire taps and the like if a case can be spun as something related to national security. Now, if this expansion gets passed, you won't need a court to issue a subpoena... hell, if you are subpoena'd, you can't even say you were if it's a "secret" one. The courts act as a check against unreasonable police action... but that's being taken away.
Lets say you get an FBI agent who decides to abuse his power, or say there's some sort of internal agenda being pursued (don't say it can't happen... it can, it has, it likely will again) and you get caught in their crosshairs. They somehow spin something up on grounds of terrorist ties (you at one time were on the same mailing list as the brother's cousin of a known terrorist) . All of your financial and medical documents are subpoena'd and you may never know. If you do for some reason know about it (i.e. they require some directly from you) you have NO recourse. Can't go to a lawyer to fight it, since if it's a "secret" one you can't even tell anyone it happened. The courts aren't required to issue them, and you can't run to them when there's an abuse.
I think there is a line in the sand that represents the balance between personal freedom and security. The Patriot Act is setting us up for a nice running long-jump OVER that line.