> [The Patriot Act] contains many sunset provisions beginning December 31, 2005, approximately four years after its passage. Before the sunset date, an extension was passed for four years which kept most of the law intact. In May 2011, President Barack Obama signed the PATRIOT Sunset Extensions Act of 2011, which extended three provisions. These provisions were modified and extended until 2019 by the USA Freedom Act, passed in 2015. In 2020, efforts to extend the provisions were not passed by the House of Representatives, and as such, the law has expired.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act

I have deep disagreements with my father on this subject. He worked as a federal agent for 30 years, mostly in digital forensics. He does not believe in the right to privacy in any of the same ways I do. Whereas I believe a right to privacy in your tools and communication is essential, he believes they infringe on the government's ability to catch criminals. Classic justification of "if you're not a bad guy, what do you have to hide?"

I just thought this was worth sharing, my dad was a tech guy (though not much of a programmer), the folks on HackerNews and related sites mostly have a privacy-first worldview. But not everyone shares this view, especially those who work in or around law enforcement. Civilians who believe in the right to privacy must stand their ground in the face of this.

A few years ago, I tried to open a bank account, and was turned away because my visa stamp expired (despite having valid immigration status). The clueless clerk and her advisor were going through The Patriot Act to find justification.

Fortunately, other banks weren't staffed with idiots, and I was able to open an account elsewhere after providing my documents.

I think the case for why strong encryption is important is much clearer than why untraceable financial instruments are important and I don't think it's super compelling to argue that these things are actually the same, even if your opposition to government control is the same.

I think it's actually pretty clear that almost all people are not capable of secure and reliable self-custody and would be better off with an intermediary. We're not keeping our fiat currency in a safe under our bed after all.

It’s worse than that. Roe v. Wade associated privacy with abortion in the US, so the Supreme Court eliminated the right to privacy as part of the decision to overturn Roe v Wade.

Mere criminality wouldn’t put privacy in such an indefensible position. Look at who’s president.

I have a grad school professor that owes me $1M dollars on a bet that the Patriot Act would never end. I told him he was painfully naive and not suitable to each graduate school economics with such thinking.

Agamben wrote some interesting analysis of this [1], expanding on the concept of the "state of exception", which was a older concept introduced by a much more odious man who employed it very effectively in the early 20th century. Agamben argued that modern governments now try to create permanent states of exception, of which I would argue the Patriot Act is a perfect example.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giorgio_Agamben#State_of_Excep...

Really hope they ban it in the US so it can flourish in countries that actually need and respect it

I still have the 2600 issues before and after 9/11.

At the time it was pretty clear that the federal government was going make a large and permanent power grab.

No one willingly gives up power and if it’s the U.S. government there is a large ecosystem worth hundreds of billions around the patriot act, it’s never going to be sunset, and it not going to grow

War on Terror AUMF is still in force and is why the President can just decide to bomb whatever country they want without asking for permission, now.

All that shit after 9/11 was crazy and dangerous, and some of us said that at the time, and go figure, the fucking obviously true things we were saying have turned out to be... true. What a surprise.

"I will only insert the tip and briefly, I promise" - then proceeds to f*ck the nation unconscious.

> concentrating power

Isn't that the actual point? of laws like this? Keeping those in power in power and further entrenching the moats around them.

Maybe in 2028 a presidential candidate can run with removing the Patriot Act as one of their campaign points. I suspect the world will be very different then. The America I knew, remembered, and loved started dying with the passage of the Patriot Act.

Could not have said it better. You put it up beautifully. Thanks.

And it happens exactly as predicted. Surprise!

If only there were some sort of loud opposition to this act, predicting exactly the situation we're in today. Our elected representatives would have had to take a hard look at this and reject it due to its danger!

> concentrating power in a few regulated intermediaries. That’s not healthy for innovation, or democracy.

How are "regulated intermediaries" not democratic? If they're regulated by the democratically elected government, that seems entirely democratic to me.

Democrawhat?

We all remember fighting this battle at the time ...

Great to know our prediction of where this would end up was right.

Tragic to know our prediction of where this would end up was right.

I can only hope those at the time who denied this are caught up in said dragnet. A bit like immigrants voting for Trump, I digress.

This should surprise literally nobody. Let me briefly explain the US political landscape.

Classic liberalism is a pollitical and moral philosophy that came about in the last 600+ years that (among other things) enshrined individualism and private property. This evolved hand in hand with enclosures (ie private property) and ultimately led to capitalism as an economic system.

Colloquially, "liberal" is used to describe someobody who is socially progressive, typically a Democrat, but that really has nothing to do with the origins.

Neoliberalism is what liberalism evolved into, primarily in the 20th century. The key principles are that capitalism (the "free market") is the solution to basically all problems and deregulation (to increase profits, basically).

Everybody is a (neo)liberal. Democrats and Republicans both. Note that "leftists" are by definition not neoliberals and are anti-capitalist but people often mistakenly use terms like "liberal" and "leftist" interchangeably when they couldn't be more different.

Imperialism is the highest form of capitalism. Fascism is capitalism in crisis. The Democratic Party as it exists in the US today, is controlled opposition.

So we come to the Overton window. This is how it goes:

1. Republicans pass some legislation like the Patriot Act to take away rights, usually under the guise of "security". The Patriot Act of course was passed in the aftermath of 9/11;

2. Ultimately the Democrats get in office and... don't reverse it. It becomes the new normal. They do this by being institutionalists. But defending institutions is merely an excuse for inaction.

3. Come the next election the Patriot Act or the border wall or whatever will the new normal and some even more fascist legislation will be on the table. As an example, try and find the daylight between the immigration plan of the Kamala Harris 2024 campaign and the Trump 2020 immigration plan (that Democrats opposed at the time).

Nobody cares about our individual rights. Things continue to get worse because both parties will always choose the US imperial project and the profits of corporations over your rights. We are six companies in a trenchcoat.

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