America wrestles with privacy vs. security

The Pentagon justified this extension in a report last month titled "Strategy for Homeland Defense and Civil Support." Pentagon officials wrote: "Our adversaries consider US territory an integral part of a global theater of combat. We must therefore have a strategy that applies to the domestic context the key principles that are driving the transformation of US power projection and joint expeditionary warfare."

What military leaders see as a new threat at home, others see differently.

"In the absence of clear guidelines and effective oversight, the US military is becoming increasingly involved in domestic operations, including surveillance activities that blur the traditional distinction between foreign intelligence and domestic security," warns the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy.

Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee last month approved an expansion of FBI investigative powers enabling it to issue "administrative subpoenas" for personal information without judicial authorization. Senator Ron Wyden (D) of Oregon warns that the move "raises the risk of real abuse."

"Doing so would give the FBI the authority to demand just about anything from just about anybody, with no independent check, simply by claiming that it is relevant to a national security investigation," says Mr. Wyden.

For now, the focus is on reauthorization of the Patriot Act.

A bill in the House of Representatives, which was taken up on the floor Thursday, would extend all provisions of the law that are set to expire in December. But proposed amendments would limit the law, ending "roving wiretaps" and adding judicial oversight to search and seizure provisions. On Tuesday, a coalition of organizations - ranging from Americans for Tax Reform on the right to the ACLU on the left - urged caution in reauthorizing the act, noting that some sections now violate civil liberties.

Speaking in Baltimore Wednesday, President Bush said, "This is no time to let our guard down, and no time to roll back good laws."

"The Patriot Act is expected to expire, but the terrorist threats will not expire," Mr. Bush said. "I expect, and the American people expect, the United States Congress and the United States Senate to renew the Patriot Act, without weakening our ability to fight terror, and they need to get that bill to my desk soon."

The President would like to see that happen without amendments to the law, but that seems unlikely.

Sen. Wyden, a member of the Select Committee on Intelligence, describes the process of reauthorizing this controversial legislation as a "high-wire act."

"Success means striking a balance, an equilibrium, between fiercely protecting our country from terrorism while still preserving the privacy and civil liberties that make our democracy so precious," he says.

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