Date: Fri, 28 Jun 2002 02:09:48 -0400 (EDT)
From: belmonte@MIT.EDU (Matthew Belmonte)
To: john_kerry@kerry.senate.gov (John Kerry)
Subject: oppose Bush's proposed Department of Homeland Security

Dear Senator Kerry

I write to communicate my concerns regarding President Bush's plan to create a
cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security, a change that would reify the
country's recent moves toward expanded police powers and gutted civil
liberties.  The United States already maintains a host of
intelligence-gathering agencies within the Department of State, the Department
of Defense, and the Department of Justice.  Adding another will merely expand
the red tape.

Bush's proposal is made particularly onerous by its inclusion of an exemption
from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), and a provision
for waiver of the employee protections of the Whistleblower Protection Act
(WPA).  FOIA already allows the government to refuse to release information
under certain well-defined circumstances -- so an exemption from FOIA cannot be
justified on the basis of security concerns.  And it was WPA that gave FBI
agent Coleen Rowley the protection that she needed in order to come forward
with her criticisms of the FBI's handling of leads in the months before
September -- by facilitating conctructive criticism, WPA actually gives
government agencies added strength.

I fear that the United States is steadily sliding back to the days of Richard
Nixon and J Edgar Hoover, when government investigational powers were
regularly used for political and social ends, and First Amendment activities
resulted in the collection and maintenance of files on people innocent of any
crime.  It is a great irony that the United States still touts itself as the
model of freedom and democracy.

Matthew Belmonte