I agree with you, the reauthorized patriot act does include so-called “safeguards” to restore our constitutional liberties. But these are really only cosmetic changes, and miss the point; we shouldn’t even have a Patriot Act to begin with and the legislation still threatens our liberties. For example, the broad definition of a terrorist has not changed. Protesting can still be considered a terrorist activity. H.R. 3199 resolves a few conflicts in section 215 of the Patriot Act by disallowing Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Courts the ability to obtain library and medical records of Americans with a warrant upon probable cause. However, this is a minor change because H.R. 3199 still allows foreign courts to obtain Americans records in terrorist investigations while their standards to issue warrants is under par in accordance with the constitution. The Patriot Act greatly expanded the use of National Security Letters (NSL) against innocent citizens to gather their personal information rather on terrorists. The abuse of NSLs hasn’t stopped. Barack Obama compromised and voted for the lesser of two evils. The end result; the government still has power it shouldn’t have.

If our elected officials were truly concerned with the protection of our liberties they wouldn’t make constitutionally inadequate revisions to disguise liberty-eroding legislation as an improvement over the original legislation, they wouldn’t have passed the Patriot Act to begin with because it’s unconstitutional. Barack Obama wasn’t in office for the original vote, but when he had the opportunity to vote no, he compromised; giving George Bush a rubber stamp approval to continue undermining the constitution and our liberties while failing to understand along with almost everyone else in congress; if the legislation is unconstitutional, you don’t vote for it.

Barack Obama thinks when government fails, the solution is more government. But this doesn’t solve our problems. The founding fathers warned about overreaching government powers in the time of war and the need for a vigilant populace to prevent abuses in the future.

Even with all the new revisions, the Patriot act was used against Eliot Spitzer for his banking transactions, not anything terrorist related. I condemn what he did, but proves that laws don’t keep government power in check; only the people do. Abuse of power is not limited to George Bush, Bill Clinton did as well. Government will always find a way around the law when it suits their purpose weather a democrat or republican is in office. That’s why it’s important to maintain the system of checks and balances and not to compromise.

If Barack Obama is worried the Patriot Act is needed, law enforcement still have legal tools to investigate terrorist related cases and warrants can still be made in the event of an emergency. When there is no time to issue a warrant, law enforcement is still able to perform investigations.

We should be worried the government is gathering too much information on innocent Americans and using it in mischievous ways, while overloading law enforcement resources and diverting their attention away from actual terrorist threats and suspects. The Federal government has not presented evidence that the Fourth amendment impeded investigations into terrorism. Ineptness and negligence by the govt. are the major contributing factors.

We don’t need more government to effectively combat terrorism or more “safeguards” to prevent abuses of power; we need to use the tools legally available and hold the government accountable to the constitution.

If we accept any amount of government intrusion in our lives, weather it’s in the form of the lesser of two evils, or the absolute form of tyranny, we must accept the consequences that come with it; or maybe we can heed the Founding Fathers wisdom and reject overreaching government, period.

Obama voted for a PATRIOT Act reauthorization bill that included three key changes designed to prevent abuse of authority by law enforcement. Your shirt is misleading and inherently dishonest. The again, you are a Ron Paul fan, so misleading and inherently dishonest is expected...

Obama voted for a PATRIOT Act reauthorization bill that included three key changes designed to prevent abuse of authority by law enforcement. Your shirt is misleading and inherently dishonest. The again, you are a Ron Paul fan, so misleading and inherently dishonest is expected...

Obama voted for a PATRIOT Act

Obama voted for a PATRIOT Act

Obama voted for a PATRIOT Act reauthorization bill that included three key changes designed to prevent abuse of authority by law enforcement. Your shirt is misleading and inherently dishonest. The again, you are a Ron Paul fan, so misleading and inherently dishonest is expected...

He voted to re-authorize it on March 2, 2006. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=2&vote=00029#state

Obama didn't vote for the PATRIOT Act. He wasn't even a senator when the act was passed.