The State Has the Power to do What?!

The enormous power of certain elements of U.S. federal and state government is something to concern us as citizens.  From intruding into social media, searching our person or tracking our whereabouts without due cause, and state legislatures waging war on women, the power is being overused.


Negative use of social media - Isn’t it ironic that in the same period as the announced Untied States initiative against (Syria and Iran) for the use of social media to target its citizens, we learn that USA Today may have been the target of a false propaganda campaign coming out of the Pentagon.

Invasions of privacy - Despite a recent ruling that people being arrested for very minor offences can legally be strip searched, the Supreme court seems troubled by police GPS tracking efforts and will rule on that case sometime before June

Impose more restrictions on reproductive rights - According to the Guttmacher Institute, 6 states have passed laws requiring abortion providers to perform an ultrasound on each woman seeking an abortion. Medical personnel must provide the woman an opportunity to view the image.  A recent Texas antiabortion law is now being enforced following court rulings.  In a February story by Reuters, the law is, to quote:

a law requiring abortion providers to show or describe to a woman an ultrasound image of her fetus . . .
While most of those states allow women to decline to view the image, Texas, Oklahoma and North Carolina require women to hear the provider's verbal description of the ultrasound.  The laws in Oklahoma and North Carolina are temporarily not being enforced, pending court challenges.

The supreme irony regarding “power-over” us, is that it can be misused by the institutions we are supposed to be able to trust – the Supreme Court and the military—as well as the far right wing of the Republican party.

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WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 27: U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, seen through a television camera view finder, addresses the Homeland Security Policy Institute January 27, 2011 at George Washington University in Washington, DC. Napolitano announced that the color-coded Homeland Security Advisory System will be replaced by a simpler two-tier system. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

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Source: CQ Homeland Security.  Rob Margetta, CQ Homeland Security Editor; Arwen Bicknell, Behind the Lines Editor
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Trade-offs within your national security protection -

There is no easy way to cover our nation's security needs.  And its success is always a mixed bag.  Here are a few current examples of how easy it is to get off track --
This overcompensation in airport security may pose a health risk to travellers.

• U.S. Glossed Over Cancer Concerns Associated with Airport X-Ray Scanners -- Experts say the dose from the backscatter is negligible when compared with naturally occurring background radiation, but a linear model shows even such trivial amounts increase the number of cancer cases . . . [via Scientific American]

The slowdown of donations to WikiLeaks is threatening its very existence.  Moreover, Julian Assange can now be extradited.  Free speech remains at risk.

• @wikileaks WikiLeaks Free speech isn't free: WikiLeaks needs you wikileaks.org/support [via Twitter]

Those in Congress who voted for this legislation did not do their homework.  Money may have been wasted, that could have provided security elsewhere

• DHS Doesn’t Want Its New Spy Drones: Department officials were surprised, to say the least. See, new Predators weren’t exactly on their surveillance gear wish list. “We didn’t ask for them,” an unnamed official told the Los Angeles Times. DHS is already struggling to operate their seven existing drones. [via Wired.com]

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the main investigative arm of the U.S. government, is supposed to do more than merely domestic surveillance.  They are also charged with investigating white collar crimes.  Bank fraud may go unpunished.

• The FBI: Now, with 48% More Domestic Surveillance … but No Banksters. . . It has netted precisely zero of those who propagated the complex fraud that brought down our country–not even Angelo Mozilo or anyone from Goldman Sachs, against whom they’ve got reams of evidence. The FBI calls this emphasis on terrorism (and spies and hackers and corrupt politicians and Japanese gangsters) over white collar crime a “strategic” focus. Sort of makes you wonder what objective this strategy is supposed to accomplish. [via emptywheel.com]

The focus on national security too often gets blurred.  Citizens can become more at risk than protected when an agency goes off course.  Constitutionally protected rights can be ignored in the name of making us safer.  Money gets wasted that could be put to better use.  And the law can be subverted when it is not enforced.  Be very careful what you wish for.

Posted via email from Southwest Postings