More on yesterday's FISA court opinion rejecting the Department of Justice's proposed guidelines for electronic and physical searches based upon the Government's erroneous argument that the Patriot Act now allows it to get FISA warrants where the main purpose is to further a criminal investigation rather than to gather foreign intelligence information (and points out their errors in 75+ previous applications):

For analysis, the ACLU is right on target and Jason Rylander's excellent comments are here.

Book Plug: For an an in-depth, section-by section analysis of the Patriot Act, for only $19.00, check out Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT ACT) Act of 2001: An Analysis by Stanley Mailman; Jeralyn E. Merritt; Theresa M. B. Van Vliet; Stephen Yale-Loehr (published by Lexis Publishing and available on line through the link above or the Lexis.Com bookstore.)

"It contains expert analysis of the important substantive changes included in the Uniting and Strenthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT ACT) Act of 2001, Pub. L. No. 107-56, 115 Stat. 272. The organization of the pamphlet tracks the legislation, broken down into sections discussing the statute's provisions with respect to each of the following topics:

enhanced surveillance procedures
money laundering and financial crimes
protecting the border
investigation of terrorism
providing for the victims of terrorism, public safety officers, and their families
information sharing among federal and state authorities
strengthening the criminal laws against terrorism
improved intelligence

The authors describe the important changes made by the legislation and analyze the potential impact of those changes--both positive and negative."

TalkLeft's publisher and principal writer/voice is a proud co-author of the work.