PunkAssBlog.com

Welcome to the new USPS! Formerly the United States Postal Service, the only (official) moneymaking sector of our government has re-christened itself at the behest of the Bush administration as the Unnecessarily Sneaky Privacy Shitter-on-ers:

The White House on Thursday defended a policy allowing the government to open mail without a warrant, despite criticism that the crime-fighting tactic might lead to privacy breaches.

Whenever I talk about privacy, I feel like the curmudgeonly old-timer shaking his stick at the young-uns. “In my day, we valued and protected these things called individual rights! All you kids today, all you care about protecting is your right to myspace and the next season of American Idol. Harrumph.” [shakes cane]

It’s a dead notion, isn’t it? I mean, even if you still care about protecting privacy, do you really still believe it’s possible? If someone wants to find out something about you, they can and will. These days, privacy can only be realized through true anonymity or tremendous wealth. The rest of us are hanging out with the diving guy in the fish bowl, waiting for someone to look at us.

I also find it amusing that the administration famous for blowing the kneecaps off habeas corpus is now taking heat for rummaging through your junk mail, as though they’ve made a sudden and surprising leap off the cliff of integrity. At best, this is just another branch they’ve hit during the descent.

Don’t get me wrong, though. It still sucks.

Bush administration and Postal Service officials said citizens’ mail remains constitutionally protected from unreasonable search and seizure. But White House spokesman Tony Snow said the United States needs to have the power to inspect mail in emergencies.

Ah, emergencies. Right. Based on their response to Katrina, Bush’s famous facial expression after being told of the attacks on the World Trade Center, and the level of risk Saddam Hussein actually presented to the United States, this executive branch may need help understanding what an emergency actually is.

Perhaps a checklist would be helpful:

1. Have lots of people died, or are they presently dying?
2. Will the federal government’s failure to act or intervene certainly cause many more people to die?
3. Are you making up your answer to question #2?
4. Seriously, have you checked with someone who doesn’t stand to make lots of money off the answer to question #2?
5. Have more people died since you started reviewing this checklist? If so, this is probably an emergency.

The mail controversy erupted Wednesday after a report in the New York Daily News that President Bush on Dec. 20 attached a so-called signing statement to a new postal law. The statement grants the government the authority during emergencies to bypass a law forbidding mail to be opened without a warrant.

Snow said Bush was simply reiterating authority the government already has under the law.

Because manufacturing redundant laws through unconstitutional means is an ancient tradition of the office of the president.

U.S. Postal Service spokesman Thomas Day concurred. “The president is not exerting any new authority,” he said.

He also added, “And they told me if I didn’t say that, they’d feed me to Dick Cheney’s soul demon.”

Snow did not say what emergency circumstances might warrant inspections of the mail.

I would refer Mr. Snow to the checklist for assistance.

Brian Walsh, a lawyer at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said the authority likely would only be used in extreme cases, such as if police learned a bomb or an envelope containing anthrax or another biohazard was in the mail.

If the government didn’t have the authority for prompt inspections, the mail — particularly overnight delivery — could become “a courier service for drug dealers or terrorists,” Walsh said.

Could become? Every time the Post Office delivers mail to or from the White House, it’s already acting as a courier service for terrorists. I’d also wager more than one anti-choice or NRA nutjob has sent a call to violence through our postal service. It would really help if Mr. Walsh got current on the haps, particularly the strong conservative move towards terrorism.

Bottom line: bad shit is going to get sent through the mail no matter what, and no amount of privacy destruction will stop it. The most annoying part about that is most wingnuts know this. Without the postal service, they’d have a much tougher time getting their child porn.

The American Civil Liberties Union said such “deliberate ambiguity” was troublesome.

I bet I know whose mail’s getting searched first!