Bush Admin. Appoints Civil-Liberties Officer

Zephyros writes "The WSJ reports that the Bush administration has appointed a Civil Liberties Protection Officer in order to assuage the public's privacy concerns. From the article: 'As the son of a U.S. aid worker stationed in Guatemala during the 1970s civil war, Alex Joel recalls being unable to tell the good guys from the bad as both armed soldiers and civilians alike would order his family out of their car to search it. Those first-hand brushes with totalitarianism, says Mr. [Alex] Joel, have led him to take the rights of individuals very seriously.' It remains to be seen how effective he will be, but at least they're recognizing the concern."

The Real Question...

[Hangtime]

Will he have any juice to stop, sway, change direction, or do something in our best interest? Its easy to give someone a job but its quite another to give them the responsibility and the power to do it effectively.

Don't Worry...

[BoredWolf]

I'll tell you when your rights are being violated.

You shouldn't...

[SoCalChris]

I know that you were being sarcastic (At least I hope you were), but this won't change a thing.

Over a year ago, Bush created the "Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board". They haven't met a single time since the board was created.

The LA Times article that talked about it is now in their archives, and I believe is unavailable unless you pay for it.

Here is a posting that made Fark about it a while ago, although the linked to article is dead.
http://forums.fark.com/cgi/fark/comments.pl?IDLink =1923742 [fark.com]

Re:No, no, no!

[jfengel]

I'd be happy to hear alternatives. Executive appointments smack of the risk of abuse of power, but at least the chief executive is called to account for his actions every four years or so. The party in power changes every so often. If you think that elected officials are risky, unelected officials are even worse.

So either you're suggesting a radical reformulation of the way "governments are instituted among men" (and perhaps this government has "become destructive of these ends"), or you're merely pointing out the risks in hopes that people will become more observant in time for the next opportunity to change the power players in November.

Everyone is Searching for Something...

[digitaldc]

Alex Joel recalls being unable to tell the good guys from the bad as both armed soldiers and civilians alike would order his family out of their car to search it.

This is an ironic statement since he could he be talking about either Guatemala or Iraq.
Article with search pictures [www.ctv.ca]

Re:Any bests?

[bcnstony]

Dirt? It's all around him (and the US). Does anybody know why Guatamala has had a shaky political record? From wikipedia:

Guatemalan history has been marked by the Cold War between the USA and the USSR. The Central Intelligence Agency, supported by a small group of Guatemalan citizens, orchestrated the overthrow of the democratic socialist freely-elected Guatemalan government in 1954. This was known as Operation PBSUCCESS and led to over thirty years of unrest in the nation during which over 200,000 Guatemalans were killed (students, workers, professionals and opossitors of all political tendencies during the first 10 years of the repression and thousands of mostly Mayan Indians in the last phases of the conflict), more than 450 Mayan villages were destroyed, and over one million people became refugees. This is considered to be one of the worst ethnic cleansings in modern Latin America. Contributing reasons include US support of every successive, mostly non-democratic and military governments in Guatemala. From the 1950s until the 1990s, the U.S. directly supported Guatemala's army by supplying it with combatant training, weaponry, and money. The U.S. sent the Green Berets to Guatemala to transform its Army into a "modern counter-insurgency force," making their army the most powerful and sophisticated in Central America.

For more amusement, type guatamala and CIA into google.

Re:Bush's previous appointments / plans

[hcob$]

- Environment czar to relax the environment initiatives

- VP himself to supervise energy policy ... working well at 3 dollars a gallon

Pick one. Tighter environmental regulations, cheaper gas (with current technology). These two have now become mutually exclusive. One of the direct causes of high gas prices are the multiple(read dozens) formulations and qualities of gasoline/deisel that can only be sold in certain markets. Tack on the the HUGE restrictions to expanding/creating refineries (some companies worked 10+ years only to give up becuase it wasn't going to happen with current regs), and no capacity to expand production.... you get higher demand and less availability.

Go look at that economics class curve of supply and demand. With all the increase in demand and no room to increase supply.... Costs are going to do one thing. Go Up.

You can't have it both ways.

The way the founders meant for it to work

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

Read the Federalist Papers sometime. They're the design documentation for the Constitution and utterly fascinating.

What was *supposed* to happen was that the states were supposed to protect their citizens against any hypothetical tyranny by the Federal government. If not out of good will, then out of jealousy for their own powers.

That's a dead letter now.

Re:War?

[skuzzlebutt]

You don't even have to call them a terrorist...there is a political corruption trial going on here in Las Vegas, where some local officials took bribes from stip club owners. The FBI just admitted a couple of weeks ago to using the PATRIOT act to get financial data on the accused, simply because it was faster than getting a warrant, and because, well, they could. No implied terrorism, but our leaders gave the justice system a useful tool and the right to use it, so they do.

(sorry, full article has been archived by the review-journal [review-journal.com])

FBI confirms Patriot Act's use in corruption probe

By ADRIENNE PACKER REVIEW-JOURNAL. Federal authorities confirmed in court Wednesday that they used the Patriot Act to access bank records while investigating alleged political corruption involving former Clark County commissioners and strip club owner Michael Galardi.. The Patriot Act, enacted after Sept. 11, 2001, as a tool to fight terrorism, included provisions that allowed authorities to access personal financial records more easily.. During the federal trial against former county...