In St. Louis, bad behavior by police responding to protests about…previous bad police behavior—has sparked another form of protest: the publicly published protest letter.

Actually, there are two letters: One, from the ACLU, admonishes the St. Louis City Police Department to use restraint when confronting protesters. Another, from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, demands that all charges be dropped in the case of the improper arrest, during a street protest, of a fully credentialed reporter who was covering the event.

Here are excerpts from each of the letters:

ACLU

On Friday, the ACLU of Missouri sent each of your offices a letter. We implored you to remind law enforcement to allow the community to continue to express its outrage, pain and grief by protecting their First Amendment right to protest.

They didn’t.

We know there were sporadic moments of violence and vandalism – these are not covered by the Constitutional right to protest. However, outside of these moments, officers broke their vow to protect the public by engaging in illegal activities and actions that violated policies of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department and agreed-upon rules of engagement made during 2014 protests.

The letter notes that ACLU of Missouri trains legal observers to monitor demonstrations for violations of civil liberties and Constitutional rights. It then lists some of what the legal observers saw police officers doing, including:

• Attacking people indiscriminately with gratuitous use of pepper spray, pepper balls, rubber bullets, and tear gas when no apparent illegal activity had occurred.

• Excessively using of force, including violent arrests that caused injuries.

  Deploying chemicals, such as tear gas and pepper spray, without warning.

• Deploying tear gas on routes where people were leaving.

• Arresting people with questionable probable cause.

• Illegally searching bags and other possessions.

• Not wearing name tags and not identifying themselves.

• Blocking access to public spaces without apparent cause of officer safety, ongoing investigation, or public safety hazard.

• Forcefully blocking recordings of police conduct in public spaces at safe and reasonable distances.

• Selectively enforcing access to public spaces.

• Entering safe spaces against policy and with questionable probable cause.

• Using intimidating displays of force, explicitly contrary to agreement prior to release of verdict.

Calling these behaviors “unacceptable,” the ACLU urges city officials to require police officers to follow proper procedures, including:

• To not use chemical weapons, such as pepper spray and tear gas, without following the proper protocols to ensure the protection of constitutional rights.

• Officers’ nametags should be visible at all times for police accountability.

• To wear their body cameras and have them turned on at all times.

• Not use force against protesters absent a real and immediate threat of physical harm to others.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

The protest letter from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch comes in response to the arrest of Mike Faulk, a reporter who was clearly displaying his credentials, during a roundup of demonstrators in the City of St. Louis.

The Post-Dispatch condemned the “inappropriate and highly disturbing” arrest of one of its journalists on Sunday during a mass arrest by St. Louis police officers, and demanded that the city drop charges against him.

The letter, written by attorney Joseph E. Martineau, of the Lewis Rice law firm, said officers should have released Faulk immediately after recognizing he was covering a story, and allowed him to keep working.

Instead, he was arrested with “unneeded and inappropriate force” that caused injury to both legs, his back and wrist. Faulk was “forcefully pushed to the ground by police officers and a police officer’s boot was placed on his head.” After his wrists were bound with zip ties, a police officer “deliberately sprayed him in the face with pepper spray, mace or some other stinging substance.” At some point, an officer reviewed the contents of Faulk’s phone.

Inside the jail, the letter said, jail personnel denied Faulk’s repeated requests for medical attention. The city counselor’s office charged Faulk with failure to disperse, and he was released on $50 bail. He returned to the newsroom limping, knees bloodied and pepper spray still on his skin.

The city’s failure to establish a protocol to recognize and respect the rights of journalists gathering news was “a grave mistake,” the letter said.

In a comment published in the Post-Dispatch as the letter was making its way to city officials, the newspaper’s editor, Gilbert Bailon said:

St. Louis Post-Dispatch journalists and other credentialed news media provide critical information to the public. When St. Louis police arrested Mike, after he fully identified himself while covering the protests, they violated basic tenets of our democracy. Additionally, the physical abuse he suffered during the arrest is abhorrent and must be investigated. The Post-Dispatch is calling for our city leaders to immediately implement policies that will prevent journalists from being arrested without cause.

So, is the pen [aka keyboard] actually mightier than the sword [aka pepper spray, Mace, plastic wrist ties]? Let’s hope so. Otherwise, our democracy is in deep peril.

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In his book, The Republican Brain, Chris Mooney describes how there are certain types of issues in which Democrats mimic the illogical positions of most Republicans. He cites examples such as the Keystone Pipeline and fracking for natural gas. Both of these involve considerable data analysis. Sometimes Democrats distance themselves from the data because it is so complicated. Thereupon, they let their emotions guide their views, and in these cases like Keystone and fracking, they tend to favor what is perceived as preserving the environment.

It’s possible that another one of these issues is the NSA data collection, which was brought to our attention by Edward Snowden. The legality of what he did may never be determined, because to date he has not come back to the United States. The morality of what he did is certainly up for discussion.

But support for the legality of what the NSA is doing, as opposed to what Snowden did, got a boost on Friday, December 27, 2013. As CNN reported:

(CNN) — The National Security Agency notched a much-needed win in court, after a series of setbacks over the legality and even the usefulness of its massive data collection program.

A federal judge in New York ruled Friday that the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of data on nearly every phone call made in the United States is legal.

The ruling contrasts with another ruling last week by a federal judge in Washington, who called the same program “almost Orwellian” and likely unconstitutional.

I certainly don’t envy the judges who have rendered these decisions, as well as those on the Supreme Court who will ultimately decide the constitutionality (or their political preferences) regarding data that the NSA collects, and what the NSA does with it.

Progressives have generally lined up with the ACLU in wanting to curtail the extent of the data collection by the NSA. The arguments in favor of their position are both considerable and valid. The primary one is the right to privacy. While the word privacy does not occur even once in the Constitution, courts have historically recognized it as a legitimate right. Virtually all judgments in favor of privacy are based on the Fourth Amendment:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

It is not much of a stretch to extrapolate from here that electronic eavesdropping should require a warrant based on probable cause that some illegality was occurring. The right to privacy is not a luxury for a special class of people; it is a fundamental right for all of us.

We are left with the ongoing dilemma of what is more important: the right to privacy or the right to security. Neither is absolute, so we’re left to find a consensus between the two. It is presumptuous for any of us to say that we know with certainty where that line should be drawn.

I am certainly glad that Snowden provided us with a much more clear knowledge of what the NSA is actually doing. I’m also glad that a set of judges, rather than Congress, is going to set some guidelines as to how far the NSA can go. When they rule, it will not be the end of the discussion, but at least we’ll have rules that are much more reasonable than in the pre-Snowden era. Numerous questions will still remain, but hopefully we’ll be better prepared to try to answer them.

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The revelation that the federal government has been secretly gathering records on the phone calls and online activities of millions of Americans and foreigners seems not to have alarmed most Americans. A poll conducted by the Pew Research Center over the four days immediately after the news first broke found that just 41 percent of Americans deemed it unacceptable that the Security Agency “has been getting secret court orders to track telephone calls of millions of Americans to investigate terrorism.”

So writes James B. Rule in an op-ed in the New York Times.

One can extrapolate from the 41 percent in the poll that Americans are essentially split over the issue of the NSA’s collection of data from telephone and internet records. Perhaps this is a good time for a public issue to be settled by the courts. It certainly seems as if it will be, as the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) will be challenging the NSA (National Security Agency) and/or whoever is most responsible for the data-mining decision.

President Obama has said that he supports the work of the NSA, and his actions have certainly affirmed that support. In light of Edward Snowden’s leaking of the existence and extent of the program, he may well want to trim his sails and take a position more in support of preserving human rights. This is clearly a tough issue for President Obama, and for many Americans. The president is not unfamiliar with how to acknowledge his reluctance to take a definitive decision on a difficult issue. During his 2008 campaign, he was asked at what point a baby gets “human rights.”  While supporting a woman’s right to choose, he said that an answer to that question was “above his pay grade.” Some will say that he was punting on the issue, but others will agree with him that the question is too difficult for any human being to answer, and that to try to do so is foolish.

So it is with the current issue involving “dueling rights” of security and privacy. Like many on the left, I am queasy about this kind of collection of data by the federal government. On the other hand, if it is true that dozens of plots have been foiled by NSA data-mining, then I would be more willing to forfeit some privacy. The person who probably has the best bird’s-eye view of the situation is the President. While I trust him to make sound macro-decisions, I shudder at the thought of another Richard Nixon or George W. Bush being in a position to set broad policy for the NSA and related agencies. My one wish, as the dialogue continues on the issue, is that all participants step back from the vice of certainty. It’s really important to listen to opposing points of view.

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Once again, the Missouri legislature is attempting to change election laws by restricting voting to people who can present approved, state-issued photo identification. And, once again, legislators are pretending that photo-voter ID would be “free.” That’s simply not so.

The latest voter-disenfranchisement bill [Voter Photo Identification, SB 3] flies in the face of a Missouri Supreme Court decision that struck down an almost identical effort in 2006. In that ruling, the court said that the photo-ID law violated the fundamental right to vote as provided by the state constitution. Unfortunately, that definitive judicial smackdown has not stopped Missouri lawmakers from trying again.

Under this year’s proposed bill, acceptable forms of photo ID would be limited to:

• a non-expired Missouri driver’s license;
• a non-expired or non-expiring Missouri non-driver’s license;
• any identification containing a photograph issued by the Missouri National Guard, the United States armed forces, or the United States Department of Veterans Affairs; or
• a document issued by the United States or the state of Missouri containing the name of the voter which substantially conforms to the most recent signature in the individual’s voter registration records, a photograph, and an expiration date or if expired, the expiration is after the date of the most recent general election.

What’s different here? A lot. The proposed list is considerably shorter and more restrictive than the current  range of forms of ID that are currently accepted at Missouri polling places.

Under current law, you can vote by showing a driver’s license or state ID card from any state. You don’t have to have a photo ID: You can use the [non-photo] voter registration card issued by your county election commission. You can bring a copy of a current utility bill, bank statement, paycheck, government check or other government document that contains your name and address. Or, you can show your [non-photo] student ID from a Missouri college or university—either public or private.

Bottom line, for many Missouri citizens, the proposed voter photo ID bill makes it significantly harder to vote.

Who’s left out?

The effect would be to disqualify a large section of the voting public. According to a recent study published by Demos:

A photo ID law could disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of Missourians. Two national surveys have found that large numbers of American citizens -disproportionately among certain demographic groups – do not possess a valid, government-issued photo ID, or the required documents for a photo ID (e.g. birth certificate or passport). Secretary Carnahan too has identified as many as 240,000 registered Missouri voters – mostly the elderly, disabled, poor and minority voters – who lacked a government-issued photo ID through statewide database-matching in 2008 and 2009. More recently, the Department of Revenue estimated 253,496 registered voters in Missouri do not have photo identification on file with the Department of Revenue.

Get out your checkbook, and wait your turn

To get a “free” photo-voter ID in Missouri, a voter would have to jump through a number of bureaucratic hoops—many of which involve fees. Here’s a tally of the costs that could be associated with getting that “free” ID.

To get a voter-photo ID in Missouri, if you don’t already have one, you would have to present ALL of the following documents that apply to you:

Proof of lawful residence is among the most problematic requirements, as many Americans do not have their birth certificate, passport, or naturalization papers readily at hand.

As reported by Demos,

A national survey conducted by the Opinion Research Corporation found that 5.7 percent of the native-born adult population does not have a birth certificate or US passport at home. Assuming that this 5.7 percent share is the same in Missouri as in the nation as a whole, an estimated 238,000 Missourians would not be able to obtain the required photo ID to cast a ballot.

In addition, the survey results show how certain demographic groups would be disproportionately affected by a photo ID law because they are much less likely to have the necessary documents to acquire a photo ID. These vulnerable populations include people without a high school diploma (9.2 percent of whom lack the documents), rural residents (9.1 percent), African Americans (8.9 percent), households with incomes below $25,000 (8.1 percent), and the elderly (7.4 percent). Assuming that the above percentages are the same for Missouri as for the nation as a whole, a photo ID requirement would potentially disenfranchise:

• more than 90,000 rural residents;
• 70,000 low-income residents;
• 50,000 residents without a high school diploma;
• 50,000 elderly residents; and
• 40,000 African Americans.

State budget would take a hit, too

“Free” photo voter IDs won’t be free for Missouri state government either. The fiscal note on SB3 pegs the cost of implementing photo IDs at $21.2 million. Under the proposed law, Missouri would not charge residents for the non-driver photo ID itself. The costs would come from reduced income to the Missouri Department of Revenue, which currently charges $11 for a non-driver photo ID, and from the money that would need to be budgeted for the Missouri Secretary of State’s office for an educational campaign about the new rules and for training election workers to implement them.

Why bother?

Proponents of Missouri’s proposed photo-voter ID law say that it’s about protecting against voter fraud. But, in fact, according to Missouri’s Secretary of State, there has not been a single, documented case of voter impersonation in the state. Anyone who has ever served at a voting precinct as an election worker knows that there are many safeguards and political checks and balances already in place to make sure that voters are who they say they are. In addition, severe penalties are already on the books for voter impersonation. Under the current rules for voter identification, mass voter impersonation campaigns are highly unlikely.  So, the voter-fraud rationale for photo voter ID is clearly a ruse for the real motivation: suppressing the vote among certain demographic groups.

Photo voter ID, already struck down once as unconstitutional by Missouri’s own Supreme Court, is a repressive, anti-democratic law that Missouri doesn’t need and, oh, by the way, can’t pay for.

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On March 4^th, Senators McCain and Lieberman quietly introduced a bill that Salon Magazine’s Glen Greenwald calls “the single most extremist, tyrannical and dangerous bill introduced in the Senate in the last several decades, far beyond the horrific, habeas-abolishing Military Commissions Act.”

It is senate bill S.3081, the “Enemy Belligerent, Interrogation, Detention, and Prosecution Act of 2010,” which now has nine sponsors including newly elected Senator Scott Brown.

This bill appears to be Senators McCain and Lieberman’s response to President Obama choosing to have the Christmas “underwear bomber,” Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, tried in civilian courts. And, according to Greenwald, it is also “designed to formally authorize what the Bush administration did to U.S. citizen Jose Padilla—arrest him on U.S. soil and imprison him for years in military custody with no charges.”

This bill grants the president the power to order, arrest, interrogate and imprison anyone—including U.S. citizens—considered to be a “suspected belligerent” or a “high value detainee.” According to the bill, a person is considered a “high value detainee” if he/she fulfills one of the following criteria:

(1) poses a threat of an attack on civilians or civilian facilities within the U.S. or U.S. facilities abroad; (2) poses a threat to U.S. military personnel or U.S. military facilities; (3) potential intelligence value; (4) is a member of al Qaeda or a terrorist group affiliated with al Qaeda, or (5) such other matters as the President considers appropriate.

In other words, an individual doesn’t even have to pose a threat to be picked up, detained and interrogated by the military. Individuals can merely be determined to be of “potential intelligence value” or come under the vague mandate of “such other matters as the President considers appropriate.” After the arrest, “The High-Value Detainee Interrogation Team must make a preliminary determination whether the detainee is an unprivileged enemy belligerent, within 48 hours of taking detainee into custody.” The final determination of whether or not the person is an “unprivileged enemy belligerent” is made by the Secretary of Defense and the Attorney General. And then, the so-called unprivileged enemy belligerent can be held indefinitely in military custody.

Liliana Segura, writing at Alternet, says  “This is a defining characteristic of a military dictatorship. Where’s the outrage?”

The ACLU has expressed its vigorous opposition to the legislation, labeling it nothing less than a “direct attack on the Constitution.” “Indefinite detention flies in the face of American values and violates this country’s commitment to the rule of law,” states Laura W. Murphy, Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office.

The frightening aspect of this bill, besides the fact that it shreds the Constitution, is that it gives the president and the military the power to turn the “war on terror” against politically active American citizens who may express dissent against the policies of the government.

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