Could America be slipping into dictatorship? Former Republican Congressman from Georgia and CIA official, Bob Barr, a leading conservative, says he believes there is a real possibility that America is slipping into a totalitarian society and that the Bush administration is pushing the nation in that fateful direction. Former US Rep. Barr said that the PATRIOT Act and its pending re-authorization and expansion were more of a threat to the American way of life than any terrorist attack could ever be.

Meanwhile a coalition of civil rights groups, right and left, are urging Americans to mount an 11th hour rally against PATRIOT Act renewal. With the US Congress expected to renew harsh portions of the Act this week, they are highlighting serious flaws in the new legislation. Hopefully public sentiment and political action will sway enough lawmakers to force changes in the law. The reauthorizing bill contains new, far too broad and expanded surveillance provisions that will unconstitutionally curtail personal freedoms. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy rights advocate, says Congress should let every sun setting section die. "Several provisions can be used against Americans in a wide range of investigations that have nothing to do with terrorism," the group said in its analysis of fifteen provisions scheduled to expire on Dec. 31. Others, they charged, are too vague, jeopardizing legitimate activities protected under the First Amendment. The American Civil Liberties Union in a statement agreed, calling the joint Senate-House Conference Committee report a "concession to the White House and a curtailment of the Constitution."

You can do your part -- contact your US Senators and Congressmen and urge them to support the Senate version of the PATRIOT Act that curbs the worst excesses of the law. LINK: http://www.senate.gov LINK: http://www.house.gov

Reprinted from Sovereign Society Offshore A-Letter 12/15/05