Breathtaking Abuse of the Constitution
You've all heard about Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County Arizona right? Well, he and a special prosecutor are attempting to go after the Phoenix New Times. Unfortunately for their efforts, the paper is quite willing to publish details of their unconstitutional attempt.
h/t Roxanne for finding this.
update: Thanks to Polishifter, in comments, we learn that the case has been dropped and the special prosecutor has been fired.
2 comments:
This is exactly what I feared would start happening all over the country thanks to Bush's meme that we just have to spy on everyone in order to be safe.
Every nickel and dime fascist nazi out there with a little bit of local or state power has the ability and can ruin people's lives on a whim.
To a certain degree it's always been the case, but it's never been this easy except maybe when J. Edgar Hoover just blatantly wire tapped who he wanted and broke laws without blinking (which lead to FISA in the first place).
Now any tom, dick, or jerry Sheriff, mayor, prosectuor etc can easily make up some bullshit about terrorism, call up the DHS, and start monitoring phone calls, emails, mail, access financial records etc.
I have maintained for a long time that Bush's sneak-a-peak program had nothing to do with keeping us safe but rather was about collecting dirt on political enemies.
Bush got a PDB titled 'Bin Laden determiend to strike in U.S.' and STILL couldn't catch Bin Laden.
And now, with tens of millions of phone records and interenet histories he's going to be able to figure it out? Hardly.
A Follow up:
"Serious missteps": Phoenix New Times charges dismissed
Arizona Republic | Slate
The Maricopa County Attorney dropped all charges against Phoenix New Times less than 24 hours after the paper's owners were arrested for publishing details of a grand-jury subpoena that demanded the Internet records of everyone who has visited the paper's website since 2004. Also, the special prosecutor has been removed from the case. || Jack Shafer's comments. || New York Times: A Goldwater Institute lawyer calls the subpoena "the most sweeping deprivation of privacy and First Amendment rights I've ever seen." || Phoenix New Times: "In your face! Furious public backlash forces county attorney to drop case."
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