Mukasey: three steps forward, a big one back

On the same day I praised Attorney General Michael Mukasey for the latest of three positive developments, I got an action alert from the ACLU. It asked me to sign a petition to the Department of Justice's Inspector General, requesting him to determine whether the FBI has been violating its current internal guidelines on investigations. The action alert said:

Bush and Mukasey are at it again. They’ve announced dangerous new FBI guidelines that will severely jeopardize the personal privacy of innocent Americans. These regulations need no congressional approval and are terrifying...

If implemented, new guidelines will allow the FBI to interview you, your friends and your family under a false pretext.

The FBI could recruit secret informants and have them infiltrate peaceful protest groups.

Investigations based on little more than race, ethnicity or religion would be allowed.

The ACLU believes the proposal is unconstitutional.

But it's even worse than that. There are indications that the FBI is already acting as if the proposed new guidelines were in force.

So I signed the petition, and am asking you to sign, too (and unlike Trans for Obama Day, this won't cost you a cent). Just go to http://action.aclu.org/fbiguidelines. Here's what the ACLU suggested I send out:

Subject: We're all suspects?!

Under new FBI guidelines proposed by Attorney General Michael Mukasey, all the FBI has to do to put anybody they want under prolonged physical surveillance is assert an “authorized purpose” such as detecting or preventing crime or protecting “national security."

These kinds of Bush/Cheney/Gonzales/Mukasey “just trust us” policies have been eroding our rights for the past eight years. After illegal spying and top-level torture policies coming from the White House, this is absurd. Enough is enough!

These new guidelines would allow the FBI to interview you, your friends and family under a false pretext. The FBI could recruit secret informants, and have them infiltrate peaceful protest groups. And the FBI to could initiate investigations based on little more than race, ethnicity or religion.

The FBI could also search commercial databases for personal details about your life with no real reason.

And all of this would be allowed without an ounce of evidence that you or anyone else has done anything wrong.

These guidelines represent one step closer to a police state. And the worst part is that there is good reason to believe the FBI has been violating its internal guidelines all along.

Fortunately, there is something we can do about this before the new regulations are implemented.

I just demanded that the Inspector General at the Department of Justice launch an investigation to determine if the FBI has been violating its own guidelines. The Inspector General’s office at the Department of Justice has proven to be an unbiased, internal watchdog that has consistently exposed wrongdoing. We need to urge the IG to do it again. Take action now at:

http://action.aclu.org/fbiguidelines