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"Privatizing" the Police State Federal and local police agencies nation-wide “have been gathering Americans' phone records from private data brokers without subpoenas or warrants,” reports the AP. The wire service does not exaggerate in its observation that this privatized subversion of the Fourth Amendment “raises civil liberties questions.” Indeed. The question that occurs to me is this: If the federal Homeland Security apparatus, or its local affiliates (what were once independent, local police agencies) can circumvent constitutional restrictions by contracting with private agencies to do the dirty work, do we retain any civil liberties at all? The AP story points out that at least $30 million was paid last year by the Feds to various information vendors, but that this figure is probably much too low because “brokers said they rarely charge law enforcement agencies.” Yes, I'm sure vendors are more than willing to comp a few jobs for the police, since many of them are engaged in unethical or illegal activities themselves. Witness the fact that executives from firms acting as data brokers are planning to take the Fifth when they're summoned to testify before Congress about their activities. Hey, here's an idea. If Congress really wants to get to the bottom of what these guys are up to, why doesn't it contract with a private interrogation firm – one that's not bound by the Fifth Amendment – to question the data brokers? I'd be willing to perform any hands-on questioning for a very reasonable fee. If the interrogation involves the people responsible for selling my phone number to the pestilential phone solicitors who continue to plague my household, I'd be willing to offer my services in exchange for ... let's say a Thai dinner and full legal immunity. In defense of the criminal means used by private data brokers to collect personal information, James Bearden, an attorney for several of those firms, deploys what I call the “Measure for Measure Defense.” That name is taken from a key line in my favorite offering by the Bard: “Thieves for their robbery have authority when judges steal themselves.” Bearden, reported the AP, “likened the [data broker] companies' activities to the National Security Agency, which reportedly compiles the phone records of ordinary Americans.” “The government is doing exactly what these people are accused of doing,” whines Braden. “These people are being demonized. These are people who are partners with law enforcement on a regular basis.” Right on, bro! Equal rights for private-sector police state thugs! Why should the Feds alone enjoy the privilege of spying on ordinary citizens, rummaging through their personal business without a warrant, or even detaining, torturing, or killing them when the Great Decider deems it necessary? Of course, in “liberated” Iraq, private contractors already free to do all of those things. Why should America's Homeland Security apparatus and its private appendages be denied similar privileges? After the long-percolating NSA illegal surveillance scandal finally bubbled to the surface last December, many of Bush administration's defenders insisted that Americans really shouldn't be alarmed, their privacy is routinely violated by private data brokers anyway. Now private info brokers insist that what they're doing must be legal, since the government's doing the same thing. Here we see a perfect circle of mutually beneficial, self-justifying corruption. Imagine the victim of a gang rape being told that he or she has no legal recourse, because police officers were among the assailants: Since the rape was going to happen anyway, the police were entitled to join in, and participation by the police conferred legitimacy on the actions of the private sector rapists. Prior to being appointed CIA director, Colonel Klink lookalike General Michael Hayden presided over the illegal surveillance program as deputy director of the NSA. When confronted about the program by reporter Jonathan Landay of the Knight Ridder news service, Gen. Hayden blithely re-wrote the Fourth Amendment to omit the need for search warrants issued on the basis of “probable cause.” “My understanding,” stated Landay, “is that you must have probable cause to be able to do a search that does not violate an America's right against unlawful searches and seizures.” “No, actually the Fourth Amendment actually protects us all against unreasonable search and seizure,” replied Klink-Hayden. “That's what it says.” This is a bit like claiming the Seventh Commandment says, “Thou shalt ... commit adultery” -- which it certainly does, if we're willing to excise one troublesome word, to wit, “not.” Similarly, the Fourth Amendment specifies that the right to protection against unreasonable search and seizure is “violated” unless the government first obtains a warrant issued “upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.” “Believe me,” insisted Klink-Hayden, “if there is any amendment to the Constitution that employees of the National Security Agency are familiar with, it's the Fourth....” This is true in exactly the same sense that bank robbers are intimately acquainted with laws against robbing banks. Criminals are generally quite familiar with the laws they break. But according to Klink-Hayden, the NSA was given a plenary indulgence to violate the Constitution: “I am responding to a legal order, alright? The Attorney General has averred to the lawfulness of the order.... I am convinced that what we're doing is lawful, because what it is we're doing is reasonable.” As long as a high-ranking spokesman for the regime avers that something is legal, it must be legal. That fits pretty nicely with Saddam Hussein's ruling doctrine: “Law consists of two lines above my signature.” Saddam's ruling philosophy was cognate with the Bush administration's doctrine of the “unitary executive,” under which whatever George W. Bush decrees is law – and anything done by his authorized representatives is legal. Through the process of privatization, that same immunity is extended to corporate contractors as well as government employees. And it's not just a handful of grubby snoops or low-caliber thugs we're talking about, either. For example: Since 2002, the NSA has apparently been using a major St. Louis AT&T facility to spy on internet traffic. Former AT&T employees described to Salon a secret room at the facility to which only Spooked-up government drones were admitted:” ... only government officials or AT&T employees with top-secret security clearance are admitted to the room, located inside AT&T's facility in Bridgeton. The room's tight security includes a biometric `mantrap' or highly sophisticated double door, secured with retinal and fingerprint scanners. The former workers say company supervisors told them that employees working inside the room were `monitoring network traffic' and that the room was being used by `a government agency'” -- most likely our dear friends at NSA. This cyber-spy facility went on-line in 2002, under Gen. Hayden's supervision. It's worth remembering that the fusion of corporate interests and an all-powerful central government under a lawless executive is called “Fascism.” ---------------------------------------------------
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