In the aftermath of the attacks on DC and NYC last week, it seems that politicians and gov’t officials are on the lookout for any one or thing that could have even possibly played a role in these attacks. Because the terrorists who carried out these attacks are not organized like a conventional army, it appears that they took advantage of the same rights, freedoms and technologies that the rest of us use and take advantage of in our daily lives–the same rights and freedoms which Prez. Bush has said these terrorists hate and that we must defend. Yet Bush has also publicly stated that we have to be willing to give up some of these liberties in the effort to prevent future terrorist attacks.
Slashdot has been leading the charge in standing up for our rights and liberties on-line, especially the right to privacy, which is protected by the use of cryptography. On Saturday a small group of geeks gathered at the University of Maryland in Baltimore along with Rep. Lynn Rivers of Michigan to strategize ways to oppose the curtailment of civil liberties. Slashdot provides this synopsis and call to arms. Wired News has this report on the meeting, and ZDNews carries this Reuters story titled “Digital privacy may suffer amid attacks.”
As the Wired and Slashdot stories say, now is the time to contact your elected reps and ask them not to slice away at civil liberties in the vain hope that this will seriously affect terrorism. Protecting our free nation from terrorism begins to ring hollow when we give up our freedoms for that protection. Dissent is not unpatriotic, but indeed the greatest tool of the patriot to affect positive and progressive change. To get contact info for your federal representatives, check out the Senate and House websites.
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