FCNL: Rights and Liberties Weekly (03/13/06)

FCNL Rights and Liberties Weekly Volume 4, No. 10 March 13, 2006 Extraordinary Rendition: Bills have been introduced in both the House and Senate which would curtail “extraordinary rendition.” Extraordinary rendition is the U.S. practice of transporting people for interrogation, detention or trial to countries with where torture or inhuman treatment is known to occur. The bill numbers are S.654 and H.R.952, and you can find Leahy’s Senate version here: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:S00654: Executive Power: Robert Parry of Consortiumnews.com writes that so-called “compromises” between Congress and the president are actually consolidating executive power. “The legislation on warrantless wiretaps now promises to be the next White House ‘concession’ that will, in reality, consolidate Bush’s autocratic power.” The full story is available here: http://consortiumnews.com/Print/2006/030906.html Sunshine Week: As Sunshine Week gets underway, U.S. News & World Report interviews Steven Aftergood, the secrecy expert behind the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists. Two short interviews about government secrecy and the Freedom of Information Act are available here: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/060320/20qa.htm Find out more about Sunshine Week here: http://sunshineweek.org/ USA PATRIOT Act Renewal: We all know the bad news:news:news: the Patriot Act was renewed last week without many of the civil liberties-enhancing sections, originally attached to the Senate version of the reauthorization bill. However, even before the vote was finalized in the House, Sen. Specter introduced legislation that would enact the improvements which passed the Senate unanimously in July. Specter’s bill is numbered S.2369, and all the details can be found here: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:S02369: The Patriot Act reauthorization story is here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/07/AR2006030701082.html ______________________ Visit FCNL’s Website: http://www.fcnl.org Contact Congress and the administration: http://capwiz.com/fconl/dbq/officials/ Order FCNL publications and “War is Not the Answer” campaign bumper stickers and yard signs: http://www.fcnl.org/pubs/ http://www.fcnl.org/forms/forms.php?type=bump Contribute to FCNL: http://www.fcnl.org/donate/ Subscribe to this list: Send a message to rights-and-liberties-subscribe@fcnl.org or visit http://www.fcnl.org/forms/forms.php?type=ls and select the Rights and Liberties list. Subscribe to other FCNL legislative, policy, and action alert lists: http://www.fcnl.org/email/ ______________________ FCNL’s Rights and Liberties Weekly is intended as a supplement to other FCNL Civil Liberties and Human Rights Program materials and does not reflect FCNL's complete policy position on any issue, nor does it include all pertinent facts on any topic. For more information, please contact: Friends Committee on National Legislation 245 Second St. NE, Washington, DC 20002-5795 fcnl@fcnl.org * www.fcnl.org phone: (202)547-6000 * toll-free: (800)630-1330

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