ACLU held a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington DC yesterday, releasing a report, Government Must Abandon Misguided Approach to Pandemic Preparedness and warning us all of this threat to health and freedom (link to report below).
NSF's own Charlie Frohman was there and reports in his Common Interest blog -
"An avian influenza call “H5N1″ has killed birds around the world, and if it spreads to humans, President Bush has proposed military quarantines of whole sections of the population. ACLU claims coercion never protects the public health, and trading “liberty for security” is a dangerous slippery slope that justifies perpetual Rights violations.
"And despite ACLU assurances, can they really protect”our liberties” from Big Brother’s “security”? Precedent suggests not. After the September, 2001 terrorism, we suffered the Patriot Act and the Military Tribunals Act, Total Information Awareness, No-Fly lists, as well as “signing statements”. The 2006 Defense Authorization Act expanded the 1807 Insurrection Act to allow the President to declare Martial Law and send in the Military not only for insurrections, but also any “natural disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition,” with both “incident” or “condition” not defined nor limited. Further, Haliburton has built a constellation of concentration camps (like our very own Gulag Archipelago) across the U.S. - are these camps for infected patients, or civil libertarians and nonviolent dissidents (once Congress passes the “Homegrown Terrorism” bill)?"
Read more -
http://www.commoninterest.info/2008/01/16/aclu-to-protect-against-government-in-pandemic/
ACLU Report - http://www.aclu.org/privacy/gen/33649prs20080114.html
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