FBI extends massive domestic spying, aids corporations in gathering private data

Everyone in the country ought to be aware of what is revealed in this story in the Washington Post. The Bush government, using 9-11 as pretext, has mounted a massive and secretive effort to spy on it's own citizens. Bush has given the government the ability to pry into every detail of your life, without your knowledge, and with no judicial oversight whatsoever. Read the entire article and leave your comments.

The burgeoning use of national security letters coincides with an unannounced decision to deposit all the information they yield into government data banks -- and to share those private records widely, in the federal government and beyond. In late 2003, the Bush administration reversed a long-standing policy requiring agents to destroy their files on innocent American citizens, companies and residents when investigations closed. Late last month, President Bush signed Executive Order 13388, expanding access to those files for "state, local and tribal" governments and for "appropriate private sector entities," which are not defined.

National security letters offer a case study of the impact of the Patriot Act outside the spotlight of political debate. Drafted in haste after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the law's 132 pages wrought scores of changes in the landscape of intelligence and law enforcement. Many received far more attention than the amendments to a seemingly pedestrian power to review "transactional records." But few if any other provisions touch as many ordinary Americans without their knowledge.