Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's name has been mentioned for months as the possible Democratic presidential nominee for 2008, so while it's still early enough to talk rationally about such things, a few points that should trouble members of the adult industry are worth mentioning.
For one thing, Clinton is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and as such has steadfastly supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq, even though expressing her concerns for soldiers' and their families' welfare at home and abroad. However, considering the momumental revelations over the past two years of the lies, fraudulent data and arguments which the Bush administration and its allies used to trick most legislators and citizens into initially supporting such invasion, that Clinton has not spoken out in favor of a speedy withdrawal of American forces from that country strongly suggests that the American people should have grave doubts about her abilities to handle foreign policy.
Her record on internal policy isn't much better. In mid-October, she sent a letter to the House/Senate conference committee whose duty it was to iron out the differences between the two bodies' versions of bills to reauthorize the sunseting provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act. Much of her letter dealt with the use of National Security Letters (NSLs) by the FBI to obtain information about citizens' bank accounts, credit card purchases, reading materials, apartment/office leases, driver's licenses, telephone use, e-mail use, instant message use and Web surfing, all of which must be provided, under the Act, without the provider ever telling the target of the investigation that the information was sought or provided.
Over 30,000 NSLs were issued last year, with just one having been challenged in court by its recipient, a library in Connecticut, as violative of its patron's constitutional rights. That means that as to the 29,999 other such letters, information was provided without official question. The Act also authorizes police and federal personnel to conduct secret searches of citizens' homes and businesses without any prior or subsequent notification to the target. The effects of these policies on the Constitution's Fourth Amendment protections are devastating.
However, rather than opposing reauthorization of the clearly unconstitutional Act, Clinton instead simply urged the conference committee to adopt "important checks on the power to issue and enforce NSLs without hindering the efficacy of this law enforcement tool" – even though, as the New York Times reported on Dec. 10, "newly disclosed [FBI] e-mail messages ... show[] that, privately, some FBI agents have felt hamstrung by their inability to get approval for using new powers under the Patriot Act" and that they welcomed changes being made to the Act that would "allow[] the bureau to 'bypass' the department's intelligence office, which normally reviews all such requests."
Incidentally, according to a report by CNET's Declan McCullagh, new additions to the PATRIOT Act's powers include the creation of a new federal crime of photographing or videotaping bridges, garages, tracks, warehouses, or other facilities used by railroads, boats, or airplanes, if such recordings are made with the intent of "doing harm." Also, anyone attacking anyone else near such facilities with a weapon, even a penknife or a box cutter, will now have committed a federal felony, punishable by a stiff prison term or even the death penalty.
Moreover, the new Act increases the penalty for distribution of methamphetamines to a minor to 20 years for a first offense, and reduces the number of contraband cigarettes that qualifies as a federal crime from 60,000 to 10,000 – neither of which changes can arguably be said to have anything to do with combatting terrorism.
Finally, there's Clinton's co-sponsorship of the Flag Protection Act of 2005, S. 1911, which would make it a crime, punishable by up to one year in prison and/or a $100,000 fine, to "destroy[] or damage[] a flag of the United States with the primary purpose and intent to incite or produce imminent violence or a breach of the peace, and under circumstances in which the person knows that it is reasonably likely to produce imminent violence or a breach of the peace," or to "intentionally threaten or intimidate any person or group of persons by burning, or causing to be burned, a flag of the United States."
Even more heinous under this bill would be stealing or "knowingly converting to his or her use, or the use of another" a flag of the United States either belonging to a government facility or simply another person, and intentionally destroying or damaging that flag. That's good for a two-year prison term and/or a $250,000 fine.
The Supreme Court settled long ago a citizen's right to burn the stars and stripes as part of the freedom to protest politically, but it's hard to imagine a situation where such burning could take place in public that is NOT "likely to produce imminent violence or a breach of the peace" – thereby making that freedom functionally meaningless.
Just some things to think about as Hillary Clinton's name becomes more prominently mentioned for this country's top job.
