There was some Congressional debate over extending certain parts of the Patriot Act last week– this Institute for Public Accuracy release is a helpful guide to some of the criticisms of the Act.
But don’t let anyone tell you there wasn’t much coverage of this. On Friday, NBC Nightly News skipped reporting on what was at stake and went right for what really matters:
May 27, 2011 Friday
BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:
Back in D.C., a four-year extension of the revised Patriot Act passed by Congress was signed into law minutes before midnight last night. You would be correct to ask, with the president overseas, how exactly did he sign the bill in Washington. Well, by machine, the so-called autopen used by about the last dozen U.S. presidents. They sign their name initially by hand onto a template, then the machine recreates it countless number of times exactly, and in this case the signature had the force of law.
Civil liberties? No thanks–I just want to know about the President’s magic pen.
Progressives elected Obama to end the Patriot Act. If Obama will reauthorize it, National Security Letters and all, any conceivable president will.
Meanwhile Obama has been codifying indefinite detention, the drone strikes continue in Pakistan (with their civilian casualties to boot), and we are set to stay in Afghanistan until 2014.
I thought we elected an a civil libertarian that was going to wind down the war on terror. Unfortunetly Obama has done nothing of the sort.
It’s worth noting that NPRs own coverage on All Things Considered focused primarily on the president’s use of the autopen. I never got around to writing my complaint, but I didn’t have to. On Monday’s All Things Considered several letters of complaint regaurding the lack of coverage of the issues were read.
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