Well, think again.

According to federal law, the Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AOUSC) is supposed to report on the uses of the Patriot Act power for the government to engage in “sneak and peek” searches of Americans’ homes, offices, and other personal property without letting the subject of the search know about it.

Did you think that under President Barack Obama these searches would decline?
Did you think that this Patriot Act power was being used in order to stop terrorism?

Thanks to WTAE of Pittsburgh for digging up these annual reports (FY 2007 | FY 2008 | FY 2009 | FY 2010), which show very clearly that under Barack Obama’s administration the use of sneak-and-peek powers have accelerated, not declined, and which also show very clearly that the overwhelming majority of the time, sneak-and-peek Patriot Act powers are used for the Drug War. Less than 1% of Patriot Act sneak-and-peeks are actually used to try and find terrorists.

No thanks are due to the administration of President Barack Obama, who promised the nation he’d be a leader in transparency but which has not published these reports for public view, not even on the web page of the very Administrative Office of the United States Courts that produces the report. No thanks are due to the House of Representatives, which receives the report every year but does not publish it. No thanks are due to the U.S. Senate, which receives the report every year but does not publish it. They’d rather you didn’t know the truth these reports tell.

Finally, on December 15 2011, nearly three years into his presidency, Barack Obama got around to nominating members to sit on the Board. This means a new count begins, as the Senate Judiciary Committee takes on the responsibility of holding hearings and voting on the confirmation of those members.

It’s been 1 month and 18 days since Obama’s nominations went to the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Senate Judiciary Committee — controlled by Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy — hasn’t taken any action at all on the nominations. No confirmation vote, no hearings, no hearings scheduled.

Will we go an entire presidential term without the board’s oversight of the privacy and civil liberty record of the Obama administration?

Obama was in the U.S. Senate, and he had made a promise. Senator Obama had promised that, if there was any Senate legislation giving legal immunity to telecommunications corporations who had violated the law by supplying government spies with private information about millions of their U.S. customers (with no search warrant), he would not just vote against the legislation, but would filibuster it.

Senator Barack Obama did not keep his word. Just months after he made his promise, legislation was introduced that gave retroactive legal immunity to telecommunications corporations that had helped George W. Bush illegally spy on millions of law-abiding Americans. It was named the FISA Amendments Act. Barack Obama did not filibuster the FISA Amendments Act. He voted to approve it.

Now, as Barack Obama prepares his re-election campaign, he is being haunted by his past dishonesty. Rocky Anderson, presidential candidate for the Justice Party, is ready to remind you of Obama’s broken promise.

Anderson says, “We’ve seen Democrats and Republicans together granting retroactive immunity to the telecom companies. Then-Senator Obama promised this nation, before the primary, before he won the Democratic primary for the presidency, that he would join a filibuster against telecom company immunity. And then, as soon as he won the nomination, of course, he not only didn’t—he didn’t back off—only back off on his promise to join a filibuster, he voted for the legislation. Who in this country gets Congress to grant them retroactive immunity for committing clearly felonious acts? We need real leadership, and we need it now.”

For real leadership, vote Rocky Anderson for President this year.

Does that sound familiar? It’s the same political playbook being used by the Republican presidential candidates here in the United States of America. In today’s South Carolina primary, the remaining Republican candidates are competing over who can be the most intolerant.

Public Radio International reports what the consequences of this radical regressive approach have been for Hungary. A huge number of young Hungarians are leaving the nation for better places. They’re seeking to get away from “this whole attitude that many people have here, I think, which is, one of intolerance.”

Many young Hungarians are coming to the USA. It would be terrible thing if we disappointed them by electing an intolerant national leader of our own. To move forward, Americans need to reject the fear and hate of the Republican Party in this November’s election.

That’s the message that Mitt Romney sneered at an American who dared to ask him a question about income inequality. “America’s right, and you’re wrong,” he says. Apparently, Mitt Romney thinks that people who disagree with him don’t count as Americans. Apparently, Mitt Romney believes that only those people who don’t complain about inequality count as Americans.

Mitt Romney is wrong. Whatever Romney thinks, the person who asked him that question about income inequality is an American.

For the record, the fact that there is division in the United States of America is not a result of protests by the 99 Percent. For an entire generation, the 99 Percent was quiet, offering practically no protest as right wing politicians enacted policies that gave special perks to the extremely wealthy while taking economic power away from most Americans.

The division in America was created by income inequality, and that income inequality was created by corporate goons, trust fund darlings, and right wing politicians. The Occupy movement is only expressing that long-standing division, not creating it.

Another thing that Mitt Romney is wrong about is his idea that there’s something wrong with political divisions. Mitt Romney want so see those divisions suppressed, so that everybody gets back in line behind him and his elite class of extremely wealthy friends. We’re supposed to be good little workers, and allow those like Romney who regard themselves as born into the executive class to do the talking for us.

That’s how things worked under King George back in colonial days. It’s not how things are supposed to work in the United States of America.

Our Constitution established a democracy. The purpose of a democracy is to enable citizens to express their opinions and seek redress for their complaints, not to remain united behind their leaders like peasants. Political divisions are what the USA was made for. They’re a good thing. They help us deal with our problems.

America is a great nation because we are a divided nation. We are a divided nation because we are a free nation.

If Mitt Romney wants a united nation instead of a divided nation, he doesn’t have to travel far. He can go to Cuba. Or, he can go to China, where they put protesters in prison. He can go to North Korea. He can go to Saudi Arabia.

Those countries are united behind their leaders – because the people in those countries aren’t allowed to speak their minds. Is that what Mitt Romney wants for America?

P.S. Unless you’re gay.

171 of the protesters were dressed in orange jumpsuits and black hoods, as the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay have been made to dress. 171 prisoners are thought to remain at Guantanamo Bay to this day.

The protesters in DC didn’t know what the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay might be guilty of, but that’s the point. In the system of law that the United States of America has known, there is a presumption of innocence. Guilt can only be constitutionally determined through due process of law, including protection from self-incrimination and a fair trial.

Those standards have been thrown away at Guantanamo Bay, and now, thanks to the passage of the National Defense Authorization Act last month, and Barack Obama’s signature on the legislation, the low standards of justice that have been enforced at Guantanamo Bay are now in effect all across the USA. In this sense, the thousand protesters in DC yesterday were not just protesting for the prisoners at Guantanamo. They were protesting for the rights of us all.

This Wednesday in Washington D.C., for example, Occupy DC is leading a day of action against torture and injustice. The focus of this day of action is against the continued extralegal imprisonment of people in the prisons of Guantanamo Bay.

The issue of imprisonment without criminal charge and without fair trial has become especially important since the passage last month of the National Defense Authorization Act. The NDAA takes the injustice that had been restricted to the foreign prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and expands it, making everyone in the United States, whether citizen or not, subject to the same harsh imprisonment without access to the basic mechanisms of true justice.

The day of action this Wednesday will begin with a gathering in MacPherson Park just to the north of the White House. The gathering will issue the following demands:

Then, the protest, organized in cooperation with Witness Against Torture, will form a human chain stretching between the White House and the U.S. Capitol, with the simple message that the right to due process and a fair trial, promised in our nation’s Constitution, must be restored.

For 1060 days, President Obama didn’t do this. Until December 15 of 2011, Obama had only nominated two people to sit on the board. By federal law, three members are required for the board to meet. Until President Obama nominated a third member, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board could not have possibly functioned.

On December 15 2011, three years into his four-year term, Barack Obama finally nominated the other three members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.

Thank you, Barack Obama. It’s about time.