Finding Ulysses

During the hullabaloo after the Health Care Summit yesterday, the Democratic leadership in the U.S. House of Representatives slipped a nasty little piece of legislation through, in the guise of an amendment to a Medicare reform bill coming from the Senate. The amendment had nothing to do with Medicare, actually. It had to do with the Patriot Act.

The Patriot Act was set to expire. It was originally supposed to expire years ago, actually. So, the House and Senate judiciary committees went to the trouble of holding hearings, and arguing about the need for reforms. The need for reforms to the Patriot Act are substantial. It’s been revealed through federal government reviews that Patriot Act spying powers are being used not to investigate terrorist plots, but to spy on Americans who aren’t even suspected of having any connection to terrorism. Senator Russ Feingold pointed out during a hearing on the Patriot Act last year that “in fiscal year 2008 only 3 out of the 763 sneak and peek search warrant applications were in terrorism cases. 65 percent were for drug cases.” From last year’s hearings, some reforms were proposed. They weren’t as strong as they could have been, but at least they were a step in the right direction.

Some Republicans in Congress objected to reforming the Patriot Act, however, so this week, the congressional Democratic leadership capitulated, and agreed to extend the Patriot Act without any reforms whatsoever – as quietly as possible, disguised as a Medicare reform amendment, and without any debate or roll call vote in the Senate at all. In the House yesterday, a roll call vote took place, but only someone paying very close attention would have known that the roll call was about the Patriot Act, not Medicare reform. If you want to take a look yourself, here’s the roll call.

Defying their party’s leadership, 87 Democrats in the House decided to do the right thing and vote against the no-reform Patriot Act extension. Our Representative in Congress, Mike Arcuri, was not among that 87. Congressman Arcuri voted yesterday in favor of extending the Patriot Act without reforming it one bit.

Ulysses Democrats, is that what you thought you were voting for in 2008? You can call Arcuri’s office at 315-793-8146 to tell him yourself what you expect.