Bending the Third Rail
Because We Should, We Can, We Do
Friday, February 10, 2006
The Slow Erosion
In yet another slow erosion of our rights as American citizens, the Bush regime has stuffed the following into the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004:
Sometimes it’s the small abuses scurrying below radar that reveal how profoundly the Bush administration has changed America in the name of national security. Buried within the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 is a regulation that bars most public access to birth and death certificates for 70 to 100 years. In much of the country, these records have long been invaluable tools for activists, lawyers, and reporters to uncover patterns of illness and pollution that officials miss or ignore.

It is, however, great for corporate polluters. And many family members looking for genetic clues will be out of luck. People wanting to trace adoptions will dead-end. If you are homeless and need your own birth certificate, forget it: no address, no service.
Only two senators voted against the act.
Written at 5:03 AM by Lynne.
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