What liberties do we lose due to The Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act?

Question

What specific liberties have Americans lost due to the signing of The Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act? I'm a little undereducated about this subject and there's a wealth of information regarding it online, most of which I consider unsubstantiated hearsay. I was hoping to find concrete examples of how both of these acts have resulted or could have resulted in losses of personal liberties that would not have been lost otherwise.

Answer 1

I don't know about anyone else, but I still have all my rights.

Answer 2

How approximately freedom of speech? there are countless freedom of speech subject concerns interior the countless varieties of the Patriot Act, yet i'm going to easily point out the single linked with national risk-free practices Letters (NSL). An NSL is a letter from the administrative branch stressful information. those receiving the letter are no longer allowed to tell all people. one in all those unchecked potential encourages all varieties of abuse --think of an NSL requiring information that ought to require extensive expenses, in all risk even putting somebody out of corporation. this could be used to reason trouble for persons making waves for the administration. The 4th modification protects us from unreasonable searches. Oversight with the help of the judicial branch utilising such issues as warrants assists in holding the administrative branch in examine and abuse of potential minimized. you won't be laid low with this actual undertaking yet, yet this represents yet another nail interior the coffin of our constitutional protections. some day you will awaken and not have any rights.

Answer 3

The government for any reason without notice or charge can arrest and or detain any citizen for an indeterminate amount of time!
The arrested has no right to council!

Innocent or guilty ...how long should anyone be held and possibly tortured under these circumstances?

Some people have been held with these Acts for years!

Answer 4

You might remember that The Patriot Act was done pretty quick. Most if not all of it was existing law being applied to Drug Smuggling, selling, etc.

Perhaps someone else knows the actual specifics of existing to new law

I do know that Bill O' Reilly was offering $25,000.00 to anyone that could show evidence their rights were violated.

As far as I know he had no takers

Answer 5

They can listen or watch anything you say or do without a warrant.


Just think of it this way for a small part. Nixon wouldn't have gotten in trouble because he wouldn't have had to break in to tap those phones he could have just used the Patriot Act to listen to anything he wanted. He was basically impeached for what he did....Bush by some is praised, doesn't seem right does it.

Answer 6

here are a few:

1st AMENDMENT FREEDOM OF SPEECH• The Patriot Act broadly expands the official definition ofterrorism, so that many domestic groups that engage innonviolent civil disobedience could very well find themselveslabeled as terrorists.• The Government may now prosecute librarians or keepersof any other records if they reveal that the governmentrequested information on their clients or members in thecourse of an investigation. It has become a crime for theseindividuals to try to safeguard your privacy or to tell youthat you are under investigation.1st AMENDMENT FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION• Government agents may now monitor the First Amendment-protected activities of religious and political institutions, andthen infiltrate these groups with no suspicion of criminalactivity. This is a return to domestic spying on law-abidingreligious and political groups.• You may now be the subject of a government investigationsimply because of the political, activist, or advocacygroups you are involved in, or the statements you makewithin these groups.1st AMENDMENT RIGHT TO ACCESSGOVERNMENT INFORMATION• A U.S. Department of Justice directive actively encouragesfederal, state, and local officials to resist and/or limit accessto government records through Freedom of Information Act(FOIA) requests.• The Government has conducted immigration hearings insecret behind closed doors. Such proceedings were onceopen to the public. Hundreds, if not thousands, of immigrantshave already been deported in secret.
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4th AMENDMENT FREEDOM FROM UNREASONABLE SEARCHES &SEIZURES• Law Enforcement authorities may now conduct secret searches and wiretaps in your home or officewithout showing “probable cause.” They need only to claim that intelligence gathering is “a significantpurpose” of their intrusion, even when the primary goal is ordinary law enforcement. They may alsomonitor where and to whom you send and receive e-mail, or where you go on the Internet, recordingevery e-mail address and website you have been in contact with.• Law Enforcement may now demand any personal records held by any source including your doctor,employer, accountant, or library. All they have to do is claim that it is related to an investigation into“terrorism.” The record keepers may not reveal that your records were provided to the government.• Judicial oversight of secret searches has been effectively minimized. The Patriot Act directs judges toconsent to secret searches based only on the Government’s assertion that a “significant” purpose ofan investigation is gathering information related to “terrorism,” as the government defines it.5th AMENDMENT RIGHT TO DUE PROCESS & FREEDOM FROM BEING HELD WITHOUT CHARGE• Americans can now be jailed without a formal charge & without the right to confront the witnesses orevidence against them. American citizens are now being held in military jails without charge and with-out a clear path of appeal for their indefinite confinement.• Hundreds of Arab, Muslim and South Asian men were rounded up in the Ashcroft raids followingSeptember 11, and held for weeks without charges until all were cleared of terrorism charges6th AMENDMENT RIGHT TO LEGAL REPRESENTATION• Hundreds of U.S. residents have been detained for months at a time, and denied access to the adviceand advocacy of an attorney. The Government may now monitor conversations between attorneys &clients in federal jails.• The Bush Administration filed papers in court that arguing that an American citizen held in a militaryjail without charge should be denied access to legal counsel because such access would interfere withthe process of his interrogation.6th AMENDMENT RIGHT TO A SPEEDY AND PUBLIC TRIAL• The U.S. Government may now jail its residents and citizens indefinitely without charge & without a public trial. 8th AMENDMENT FREEDOM FROM CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENTS• The U.S. Government has taken into custody individuals they identify as “material witnesses,” trans-ported them across the country, and held them for months in solitary confinement without charge orcontact with their family.• According to the Justice Department’s own Inspector General, immigrant men rounded up in theAshcroft raids following September 11 and held in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, NYwere subjected to a pattern of “physical and verbal abuse.”14th AMENDMENT RIGHT TO EQUAL PROTECTION• Over 82,000 men from Arab, Muslim and South Asian countries registered with the Governmentunder the Special Registration program. Over 13,000 are now in deportation proceedings. Nonehave been charged with terrorism.