Have you seen Cool Onion's diaries about the proposed new US/UK Extradition Treaty? If not, you should read them immediately. Your personal liberty and fundamental civil rights are at stake. John Ashcroft, George Bush and Tony Blair have come up with a scheme to cancel all Constitutional guarantees to due process, and to enable the Bush Administration to seize you and send you to a British prison without even informing you of the evidence against you.
http://www.dailykos.com/...
http://www.dailykos.com/...
http://www.dailykos.com/...
In 1948, George Orwell's book "1984" was first printed. In that book, Orwell imagined a nightmare future where a totalitarian regime had the ability to imprison and torture its subject people without trial. Many thought Orwell was thinking of the Soviet Union when he wrote the book. Others knew that he also saw the potential for such much closer to home, within the governments of both the UK and the USA.
Well, folks, on September 7, a US Senate Committee could recommend Senate ratification of a treaty which would enable Orwell's nightmare to come true. This time, the Orwellian nightmare takes the form of a mutual agreement between the US and UK governments to send their own citizens to the other based solely on the unhearable whispered requests of Mr. Blair or Mr. Bush or their minions. If Mr. Blair wants you, or if Mr. Bush asks Mr. Blair to want you, Mr. Blair need only say the word, and the FBI will pick you up and extradite you without even the appearance of due process. Under this proposed treaty, you will have no right to a day in court and the decision to extradite you would be made by the Executive Branch of the government of the USA. You could be arrested and held for up to 60 days at the request of a foreign government, in this case the United Kingdom. Your alleged "crime" need not even be illegal in the USA. You could even be extradited for an alleged offense committed before the treaty was in force.
There is no need for Mr. Blair to produce evidence of probable cause and indeed no evidence whatsoever needs to be shown to either you or your attorney (if you even have one) before the extradition. Are you beginning to understand why you should consider this proposed treaty especially frightening? I hope so, and I sincerely hope that you will read Cool Onion's diaries and heed the call to action.
Because, dear readers, unless you intend to love Big Brother some day, you need to draw the line here. And Now!