Big Brother vs. freedom of the press

NEW YORK -- On Saturday night, April 21, two FBI agents and a member of the Secret Service served the Independent Media Center in Seattle with a sealed court order, directing the organization to provide "all user connection logs" from its website for a two-day period.

In other words, the federal government wanted the identities of everyone who visited the website and anyone who had posted information on it.

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The order stated that this was part of an "ongoing criminal investigation" regarding theft and mischief, but that the center itself was not a target of the probe.

The sealed order prohibited the news organization from discussing the situation or covering it without the threat of a contempt charge.

Apparently, what the FBI was after has to do with the theft of security plans from April's trade summit in Quebec City.

Now, I don't know much about the Independent Media Center in Seattle -- nor do I have to know much about them -- to conclude that such prior restraint by government on a press organ is a direct violation of our First Amendment rights.

The gag order has now been lifted and the center is now freely discussing the details of this case.

But such intrusive and brazen actions by the FBI and Secret Service demonstrate that none of us -- particularly those in the independent and alternative news community -- are safe from the long arm of Big Brother. Have you heard about this case from any major news agency? Has CNN or the New York Times bothered to cover it? No.

Meanwhile, let's remember that this is the same FBI that admitted last week it didn’t even bother to provide the defense -- in the highest-profile domestic terrorism case in American history -- with nearly 200 pieces of evidence. The American people -- and particularly the establishment press, it seems to me -- are way too trusting of the way police agencies exercise their power.

In the age of the Internet, it is important to remember that the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that the First Amendment protects the right to communicate anonymously with the press.

"An order compelling the disclosure of information identifying an indiscriminately large number of users of a website devoted to political discourse raises serious constitutional issues," explains the center's counsel, David Sobel of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "To provide the same protection to the press and anonymous sources in the Internet world as with more traditional media, the government must be severely limited in its ability to demand their Internet identity -- their 'Internet Protocol addresses.'"

I agree.

I don't know anyone at the Independent Media Center in Seattle. I have no idea whether the leadership there would stand up for my First Amendment rights as vociferously as I will defend theirs. But we all operate under the same protections. If we overlook government abuses in a case like this, we are inviting government abuses of our own rights.

If left unchecked and unreported, the government's heavy-handed approach in Seattle will surely become the rule of thumb. It will be only a matter of time before the Feds come knocking on our door here at WorldNetDaily -- as they have in the past.

I believe this is not only a free-press issue, it's also a privacy-rights issue. If WorldNetDaily users are not secure in the knowledge that they can visit our news-site and enjoy anonymity without the threat of government intrusion of this sort, our very existence and viability would be threatened.

And that would be the ultimate infringement on the First Amendment.

Therefore, let me say this on the record -- loud and clear for all the .gov readers out there: If you ever pull this kind of mischief here, WorldNetDaily will resist your tactics, protect our rights and defend the privacy of our readers at all costs.

Let's hope this is the end of federal snooping and electronic fishing expeditions of this kind. But let's also be realistic and understand that it is the very nature of government to exceed its defined constitutional powers.

Obviously, it doesn't matter which major party is controlling the Justice Department. The beast is always a threat to our liberties.