"Last week, such calls seemed to be answered by an ideologically diverse panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. It overturned a drug trafficking conviction because the evidence against the defendant included tracking data from a GPS receiver that the police hid under his sport utility vehicle without a warrant. The device essentially recorded his whereabouts 24 hours a day for four weeks."
In this case the police collected enough evidence to charge the defendant with drug trafficking, but the defendant walked away because his/her 4th Amendment rights had been trampled. In Holland, where I grew up, it's common for the police to install a camera in a traffic situation to photograph license plates of cars that failed to observe the speed limit. A few days later you receive a citation in the mail, accompanied by a picture of the back of your car and a request to pay the fine. Not that these cameras are everywhere. They are in places where a convincing case was made that breaking the speed limit led to a higher incidence of traffic accidents. In Philadelphia and elsewhere in the country such cameras have recently been installed at certain intersections to catch drivers going through a red light. Somehow the police is getting away with it, meaning that civil rights lawyers have not been able (yet) to overcome the public perception that such installations will help getting their crazy neighbors off the road.
Some of us don't mind standing in line, I often don't mind either, but there are situations where I do, including situations where I witness incompetence or laziness. In other cases I rationalize my fresh behavior as 'that's why I pay taxes'. This is how my reasoning goes. I am OK with paying taxes. I don't like it that year after year I have to pay more, but I have kept up paying them because I have been able to continue the lifestyle that I have grown accustomed to. I don't deny the right of the government to collect taxes and I agree with most of the reasons why, including paying for a better health care system. In my mind the government can be a power for good. It is not necessarily so, but it can be. So, while I have a foot in government, as an individual I also stand outside of government, making sure that there is a line between Us and Me. That line embodies our freedom from government intrusion. It determines what I can do without the government having a say in it. For instance, I am a savvy driver; I have a pretty good idea what I can do with my car. I even think that each driver should be instructed to figure out what the tightest spot is they can park in, what the width of the road is that will allow them to turn the car around without making a three point turn, how fast the car can drive and what its maximum acceleration is under all possible road conditions. It is obvious that most people don't know these things which is why, and this is my point, I do not wait in line in the right lane when the road splits off to the right. Instead I pass all of you who are lining up in the right lane, sometimes for more than a mile, when taking route 322 coming from I-81 to go in the direction of State College, particularly when Penn State plays a home game. It is why I always find space in the right hand lane when my left lane ends. You leave me that space and still you get angry with me for using it.
Sometimes we allow the police to do what it does because we argue 'I don't have anything to hide'. I use that line when proposing that we solve the immigration problem by issuing an identity card. I don't mind, I am here legally. I have nothing to hide. It would allow us to identify those that are not here legally. Still I don't think that w should allow the police to attach a GPS to my car, and not just because I don't want them to know about my savvy driving on route 322. No, I imagine living in a small town with a law-and-order police chief. He rules the town with an iron fist. No way to get around this dude. He is the chief and he wants us to know it. He even reads the local blogs to know what's going on around town and to see who is trying to pull the wool over his eyes. I don't want that guy to place a GPS system under my and your car. Not that he would find anything of interest, at least not with your car. It is not that I am protecting you to protect me. I do, but the opposite is true too. There are probably things I do that are against the law as the law currently stands or are at minimum opposed to how you think others should live their lives. At that interface I want some separation to let you do what I may consider a sin or a crime and for you to not know enough of me to accuse me of the same. In that sense I want the same separation between you and me as I want between me and the government. Of course, once you pass the test of family and friends, a whole new world opens up.
1 comment:
Seems to me the modern day equivalent of following cars by the police - like in the old 'films noirs,' but using modern technology. Did they always have a warrant when they did that? Of course these days they are usually high speed chases - presumably also generally without a warrant.
There is a road through Rock Creek Park where people are regularly doing what you are doing at a spot where cars line up to get onto Beach Drive. The police are often there to give tickets to drivers who squeeze in at the last minute. Cameras to catch speeding cars and drivers going through red lights have become quite common in DC, by the way.
Is it a coincidence that the ad on you page is one for a "Video Surveillance System...?!"
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