Foreigners not Equal in the Eyes of the U.S. Government?

Link to original article: http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/nationalsecurity/

President Bush Addresses CENTCOM Coalition Conference

“Our main enemy is al Qaeda and its affiliates. Their allies choose their victims indiscriminately. They murder the innocent to advance a focused and clear ideology. They seek to establish a radical Islamic caliphate, so they can impose a brutal new order on unwilling people, much as Nazis and communists sought to do in the last century. This enemy will accept no compromise with the civilized world. Here is what the al Qaeda charter says about those who oppose their plans: ‘We will not meet them halfway, and there will be no room for dialogue with them.’ These enemies have embraced a cult of death. They are determined to bring days of even greater destruction on our people. They seek the world’s most dangerous weapons. Against this kind of enemy, there is only one effective response: We must go on the offense, stay on the offense, and take the fight to them.”

President George W. Bush
May 1, 2007

Al Qaeda and its affiliates resemble Nazi Germany in the last century, do they? I have to disagree. I am beginning to think our own U.S. Government more closely resembles Nazi Germany these days. Here is an example why:

Fact Sheet on FISA Modernization

The Problem

• The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) was drafted almost thirty years ago, for the purpose of establishing a process for obtaining a court order to conduct foreign intelligence surveillance in the United States.
• However, as a result of revolutions in telecommunications technology since FISA was passed, FISA now often requires the Government to get a court order to collect information on terrorists and other foreign intelligence targets located overseas.
• It makes no sense to require the Government to obtain a court order to collect foreign intelligence on foreign targets located in foreign countries. This requirement impairs our intelligence capabilities, and diverts scarce resources that would be better spent safeguarding the civil liberties of Americans, not foreigners who wish to do us harm.
• As the Director of National Intelligence has reported, as a result of this outdated law we now are “missing a significant amount of foreign intelligence that we should be collecting to protect our country.” This is unacceptable at any time-but it is intolerable in the current heightened threat environment.

The Director of National Intelligence Has Proposed A Reasonable Solution

• The Administration proposed a comprehensive FISA modernization bill to the Congress several months ago. However, Congress has made it clear that they will be unable to act upon the Administration’s full proposal before the August recess.
• In an effort to address this critical intelligence gap, the Director of National Intelligence has proposed a significantly narrowed proposal focused on the current, urgent need to protect our Nation.
• This new proposal would substantially enhance our capabilities to collect intelligence on targets located overseas. It would also preserve a role for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in reviewing the Government’s procedures for collecting intelligence on these overseas targets. This is an effort to balance court review and our urgent need to close the current intelligence gap.
• The court review procedures would not stand in the way of starting collection of foreign intelligence immediately. The Government would have 90 days after collection has started to submit its procedures to the court for review. If the court found any deficiency, collection would continue during any and all court review processes.

What Is Not Acceptable

• • Some have proposed that the Government must obtain pre-approval from a court before it conducts critical surveillance of targets located overseas. This is unacceptable. The Government must be able to act immediately, particularly in the case of national security emergencies, to protect the Nation.
  • Some have suggested that FISA must be reformed, but only to permit collection against certain overseas threats like al Qaeda terrorists. This is unacceptable. There are many threats that confront our Nation, including military, weapons proliferation, and economic, and we must be able to conduct foreign intelligence effectively on all of them.
  • Some have suggested that we must wait to modernize FISA. This is unacceptable. Congress must act now to give our intelligence professionals the tools they need to uncover plots in time to protect our homeland.
  • Some have suggested that a court order should be necessary before our intelligence professionals are able to gather any information about a foreign target who happens to contact someone in the United States frequently. This is unacceptable.

According to this, our government believes that ‘foreign’ people somehow have less rights than the U.S. citizens in the grand scheme of things. Or at least that seems to be the message, otherwise why would they feel the need to underline ‘foreign’ so frequently. This piece is obviously meant as a scare tactic. To frighten American Citizens into believing that any non-U.S. born citizens are to be immediately distrusted. As if ALL non-U.S. born citizens are out to hurt and destroy not only The United States of America itself but are also out to personally hurt every individual U.S. Citizen. As U.S. Citizens we MUST support this modernization of FISA at the very least and anything less would cause every U.S. law abiding citizen to be under eminent danger. Sounds kinda like propaganda, huh?

Giving the government a 90 day grace period to report any foreign intelligence gathered to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and the ability to continue gathering foreign intelligence, even after this court calls the validity of such actions into question, removes any checks and balances inherited in the system, and has no place in a country where personal liberties are held in such high esteem.

I guess the question I ask is this really in our best interests? Is the false sense of safety really worth personal liberties in trade? You could say, “How does this affect me? I am an U.S. raised and born citizen?”. So take a minute and put the shoe on the other foot. How would this affect you if you weren’t an U.S. Citizen? How could this be used to harm others, innocents? Not to mention giving our U.S. government more control, more power in the long run.