WTF? Bush gives customs agents unlimited powers

[keepCAblue]

Sorry if this a dupe; just saw it -- published today in the SF Chronicle:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/24/MN9P133LEA.DTL

(09-23) 17:06 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- The Bush administration has overturned a 22-year-old policy and now allows customs agents to seize, read and copy documents from travelers at airports and borders without suspicion of wrongdoing, civil rights lawyers in San Francisco said Tuesday in releasing records obtained in a lawsuit.

The records also indicate that the government gives customs agents unlimited authority to question travelers about their religious beliefs and political opinions, said lawyers from the Asian Law Caucus and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. They said they had asked the Department of Homeland Security for details of any policy that would guide or limit such questioning and received no reply.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/24/MN9P133LEA.DTL">Continued...

[unblock]

1. f*cking f*scists!

there's NO EXCUSE for this.

they can't even pretend to be trying to find terrists this way.

do they really think that any terrist who presents a remotely credible threat can't lie in order to complete their mission???

[anigbrowl]

3. Wait...terrorists can lie? Shit, now I have to start over.

I'll get back to you after I have a new anti-lying policy in place.

Yours,

W

[Lerkfish]

2. vere are your papers, mein heir?

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. One reason why I got a cheap lappie and main puter stays home

when we travel

This has been out for months now.

Oh and if you're not afraid, to a point, you're not paying attention

[TooBigaTent]

5. Of course it is offensive, especially in the current context of "security"-uber-alles. But, Customs

has always had the "freedom" to do whatever they wanted. From the beginning, "protecting the border" was deemed important.

It is another legacy of the repuke years in power that terms like freedom, protect the border, and security have taken on such warped meanings. Sad.

[keepCAblue]

7. Not true...

As the article states, Bush's reversal of a 22-year policy now allows for these sweeping new powers. Under the prior policy, citizens were protected constitutionally from unwarranted search and seizure. If you had actually read the full article, you'd see the article explicitly contradicts your assertion:

Those policies allowed customs agents to glance at travelers' documents to see if they contained anything the agents were authorized to intercept - such as smuggled currency or obscene material - but required agents to have grounds for reasonable suspicion before taking and reading any documents, the legal groups said, quoting the newly released records.

The 1986 and 2000 policies required agents to meet a more-demanding standard - showing evidence that contained probable cause of smuggling or other wrongdoing - before copying documents, the lawyers' groups said.

"For more than 20 years, the government implicitly recognized that reading and copying the letters, diaries, and personal papers of travelers without reason would chill Americans' right to free speech and free expression," Sinnar said. "But now customs officials can probe into the thoughts and lives of ordinary travelers without any suspicion at all."

[sakabatou]

6. Orwell got it right.

[bdamomma]

8. they will keep on doing this stuff, until they are stopped.