You object to people from the government taking a piece of your property. That objection is based on an idea. Ideas, the ability to access the ideas of others, and the ability to spread ideas is the core of this nation.

Some people have money, some don't. Some people have property, some don't. Everyone has the ability to think, to some degree; all but the most profoundly brain-damaged can communicate thoughts and receive thoughts communicated by others. That's where this issue is based. The sharing of ideas is not in and of itself an activity that the government has any business monitoring.

If prosecutors want to charge criminal conspiracy, they already have working tools for that. Of course, it would mean providing evidence to support a search warrant to a judge. Why Mr. Ashcroft would think that judges are blabbermouths that can't be trusted to uphold their oaths of office is beyond me.

The snotty remark about "hysteria" sounds like Mr. Ashcroft is ticked off because someone has dared to challenge his authority to such a point that now he has to deal with it. If one can't win on principle, the next best thing is to characterize the opposition as either evil or somehow emotionally or mentally unstable. Mr. Ashcroft has gone for the "emotionally unstable" strategy because: a) he can't win on principle, since there is no justification for this power, and apparently no use for it either while there's a flood light focused on it; b) it's very difficult to characterize librarians as either evil or mentally unstable; c) since the profession is dominated by women, "hysterical" appeals to the retrograde element that still views women as emotionally "delicate". I doubt he thought it through this thoroughly. Often the words we choose say a great deal about us, inadvertently.

ATM machines are about money, and about banks (private businesses) charging what they can for their services. They don't factor in here. Besides, if investigators need access to bank records, they can get a real subpoena, the kind issued by a judge, not one they go down the hall and ask their pal Harry in the corner office to issue.

I also don't understand why you think that tax laws and the Bill of Rights are in some sort of quid pro quo relationship. If you think the tax laws are oppressive, that doesn't mean that other legal structures are in some way rendered null, or that they should be. Especially the First, upon which your ability to say that the tax laws are oppressive without being arrested depends; the Fourth, which secures your rights to security in your person, papers and other property and to be searched by specific warrant based on probable cause; and the Sixth, which guarantees your right to face your accusers.

Regards--
Mary Anne