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Lars goes off on Brandon Mayfield

At Oregon Catalyst, Lars goes off on Brandon Mayfield, the incorrectly-apprehended Portland lawyer who was subjected to surveillance, then apprehended for two weeks before being released. He won a $2 million settlement and an apology from the DOJ, but apparently Lars is not in much of an apologizing mood:

A finger print was found on a bag of detonators, confirmed to be Mayfield’s fingerprint even by a fingerprint expert hired by Mayfield’s lawyer.

Lars goes on to then take him on for using his newfound money to go after the Patriot Act:

In the meantime, his work financed with our money, is gutting the Patriot Act that has saved American lives. Brandon Mayfield, not a terrorist, but definitely a threat to my country.


Wow, where do we start. OK, to begin with, this is what Wikipedia has to say about the fingerprint issue:

As was discovered during the court case, even the FBI's own records show that this finger print, despite the sworn testimony of FBI and DOJ agents, was in all reality not an exact match but only one of 20 "similar" prints to the ones that were retrieved from Madrid.


So, now for the Patriot Act. Again, from Wikipedia:


On September 26, 2007, two provisions of the U.S. Patriot Act were declared unconstitutional. Finding in Mayfield's favor, Judge Aiken ruled that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, as amended by the Patriot Act, "now permits the executive branch of government to conduct surveillance and searches of American citizens without satisfying the probable cause requirements of the Fourth Amendment," which violates the Constitution of the United States.


Bottom Line:
It strikes me as beyond explanation how someone who would claim to be a conservative and a lover of liberty would be so eager to allow the U.S. Government to do the following to a U.S. citizen, on American soil, without a warrant:


  • Spy on them (including bugging their phones)
  • Execute searches of their home and seizing their property
  • Apprehending them without charging them or giving them access to an attorney or the courts

Does this really sound like America? It's no wonder it was struck down. Does anyone really wonder which side of this issue Thomas Paine would have come down on?

One other point to remember...safety is good...but to give up our liberty for safety, that is a price I will not pay.

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