Terrorism Bill Passes...but there's a catch...
 

First, the good news

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Senate voted 89-2 Wednesday to approve a sweeping overhaul of U.S. intelligence as proposed by the independent commission that investigated the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

The House of Representatives passed the bill Tuesday evening by a 336-75 vote.

The measure, once signed by President Bush, will overhaul the U.S. intelligence community by placing the budgets and most assets of 15 spy agencies under a new post of national intelligence director. (More details)

Among other things, it calls for U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies to share information and boosts the number of border guards and customs inspectors.

It also requires federal agencies to establish minimum standards for the states in issuing driver's licenses and birth certificates, and directs the Department of Homeland Security to establish standards for ID used to board airplanes.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/...ill/index.html

Then....the bad

Byrd said he objected to the inclusion of what he called Patriot Act-style law enforcement provisions in the bill and denounced the "misguided rush to judgment" in its passage.

The American Civil Liberties Union said the bill includes "Patriot Act-like provisions" inserted at the request of House members after immigration provisions that contributed to the delay in the House were removed.

"This restructuring will centralize the intelligence community's surveillance powers, increasing the likelihood for government abuses, without creating sufficient corresponding safeguards," an ACLU statement said.

The group said an independent review board established to protect civil liberties was weakened in the final version.

This was also added in at the last second

The rare criticisms of a highly secretive project in such a public forum intrigued outside intelligence experts, who said the program was almost certainly a spy satellite system, perhaps with technology to destroy potential attackers. They cited tantalizing hints in Rockefeller's remarks, such as the program's enormous expense and its alleged danger to national security.

A U.S. panel in 2001 described American defense and spy satellites as frighteningly vulnerable, saying technology to launch attacks in space was widely available internationally. The study, by a commission whose members included Donald H. Rumsfeld prior to his appointment as defense secretary for Bush, concluded that the United States was "an attractive candidate for a Space Pearl Harbor."

Sending even defensive satellite weapons into orbit could start an arms race in space, warned John Pike, a defense analyst with GlobalSecurity.org, who has studied anti-satellite weapons for more than three decades. Pike said other countries would inevitably demand proof that any weapons were only defensive.

"It would present just absolutely insurmountable verification problems because we are not going to let anybody look at our spy satellites," Pike said. "It is just not going to happen."

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/....ap/index.html