Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk,alt.privacy.clipper
From: [r--pp--d] at [qualcomm.com] (Ron "Asbestos" Dippold)
Subject: FBI Wants More Warrantless Wiretaps
Date: Mon, 10 May 1993 19:08:16 GMT

From comp.dcom.telecom.  I'm just waiting for Sternlight's
explaination of how this is just fine and dandy.  Ah, the
entertainment value!

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From: [r l m] at [helen.surfcty.com] (Robert L. McMillin)
Subject: Warrant?  We Don' Need no Steenking Warrant!  We're the FBI!

Buried on page A14 of Saturday's {Los Angeles Times}:

"The House sent the Senate a bill (HR 175) expanding [you mean they
don't have to get a warrant as it is??  -- RLM] the FBI's power to
obtain, without court warrants, telephone records and conversations in
probes of international terrorism and espionage.

"The bill grants the FBI access in such investigations to information
on unlisted numbers that phone companies cannot presently divulge.  It
also enables FBI counterintelligence agents to obtain a broader range
of telephone conversations involving suspected terrorists and spies.

"Supporter Ronald D. Coleman (D-Tex.) said the bill strikes 'a
delicate balance between [giving] the FBI the means to fight terrorism
and espionage and our responsibility to protect individuals from
unreasonable intrusion by the government.

"NO OPPONENT SPOKE AGAINST THE BILL [emphasis mine -- RLM].

"The vote was 367 for and six against.  A yes vote was to pass the
bill."
                          ---

I've had enough of the arguments that the government can be trusted
not to snoop on individuals.  We've seen it before when it was
*illegal*.  Now, the FBI wants -- and looks like it will get, if this
isn't killed in the Senate -- the ability to listen in on the private
conversations of Americans, without having to go before a judge or any
of those other unfortunate inconveniences.  'Delicate balance' my ass
 -- this is plain unconstitutional.  Not only do the schmucks in
Washington want ever more of your money, they want your civil rights,
too.

Operator, get me the EFF ...

Robert L. McMillin | Surf City Software | [r l m] at [helen.surfcty.com] 

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-- 
I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least";
and I should like to see it acted up to rapidly and systematically.  Carried
out, it finally amounts to this, which I also believe - "That government
is best which governs not at all." -- Thoreau