They say "kiddie porn." I say BULLSHIT!

From CNET news, by way of Americablog:

U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and FBI Director Robert Mueller on Friday urged telecommunications officials to record their customers' Internet activities, CNET News.com has learned.

In a private meeting with industry representatives, Gonzales, Mueller and other senior members of the Justice Department said Internet service providers should retain subscriber information and network data for two years, according to two sources familiar with the discussion who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The reason for all this? The Justice Department says it wants to stop kiddie porn. Doesn't that lofty goal justify anything and everything?

Nobody despises pedophiles more than I do. But that crime, hideous as it is, does not justify robbing us of every last vestige of privacy. We could prevent any number of crimes if we placed video cameras in every room of every home -- but the method of prevention would itself be a crime. (I'm reminded of the warden's great line in Phantom of the Paradise: "As a precaution, we will remove all your teeth. Teeth are a potential source of infection, and it is better to be on the safe side.")

Gonzales can never directly use in court information derived from this type of spying, since he would never dare to subject such unconstitutional activity to judicial overview. Obviously, this program exists not to combat child abuse, but to scoop up info on administration critics.

One reaction to the Americablog story demands to be repeated here:

I worked in the field of child sexual abuse for many years. I took early retirement due to the effects of doing that work - and doing it well. I was devoid of any energy.

It is NONSENSE to believe that this intrusive, illegal, and unamerican program, will do ANYTHING to fight child porn or child sexual abuse. When I saw the little shrimp Gonzales stand there and lie to us, telling us about his new initiative to combat "child porn" on the net, which is a cover to allow the government to view EVERYTHING WE DO ON THE NET, and to maintain files on each and every one of us, I knew this man was lying, and he is not a good liar. Victims of child sexual abuse and perpetrators of child sexual abuse have not risen in real numbers with the advent of the home computer. They have been around from the beginning of time. People like Gonzales spread fear, and they use the fear they create to subvert the laws and the consitution and the bill of rights of the american people

Alberto Gonzales bears at least partial responsibility for the atrocities of Abu Ghraib -- and for helping to cover up the worst that happened there. And just what was the worst of it?

American soldiers raped children.

You want to catch a child abuser, Alberto? Look in the mirror.