Sara Paretsky Writes Novel Against Patriot Act

News and Opinion for Democrats Against Bush -- Part II

Sara Paretsky Writes Novel Against Patriot Act

"What would happen to me, I worried, if my opposition to everything my government is now doing ・from outlawing abortion and contraception, to destroying drinkable water ・was defined as terrorism? What would I do if they arrested me on some trumped-up charge, such as looking at foreign language pages on the Internet? Even now, the government is holding at least two U.S. citizens without charging them, and without allowing them any access to a lawyer."

Center for American Progress*

Literary Dissent

by Sara Paretsky

To read the complete article (with a picture of the author and an excerpt from the book), click on-- http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=12760

Quotes--

In her latest novel, Blacklist, author Sara Paretsky throws her popular heroine V.I. Warshawski smack up against the Patriot Act. In this guest column, she explains why.

I don稚 know when I started feeling afraid. It might have been in October 2001 when I read about a 55-year-old Pakistani waiter who died after weeks in a U.S. prison. His crime: overstaying his visa. He hadn稚 been allowed to call his family, his consulate, or a lawyer. The government ・my government ・agreed he had no connection with terrorists, but we continued to hold him until he died.

Or it might have been the following month, when I saw reports that the FBI had picked up 61-year-old Barry Reingold in San Francisco, for saying 釘ush has nothing to be proud of. He痴 a servant of the big oil companies and his only interest in the Middle East is oil.・ Reingold told the FBI he thought he had a right to free speech. The agents said he did, but told him they were still writing a report on him.

I only know that by a year ago, when I was working on my novel Blacklist, I was definitely scared. That was when news stories emerged about police seizing a man in a New Jersey library for reading foreign language pages on the Web. They held him for three days without charging him, without letting him call his wife or a lawyer, before deciding that he wasn稚 doing anything subversive. ...

Nowadays, to search your home or office, all any law officer, has to do is tell a judge you are part of an investigation which may have links to terrorism. The Patriot Act says they don稚 have to prove you have any links to terrorism, or to any other crimes. ... Kind of like Alice in Wonderland: 的値l be Judge, I値l be Jury, said cunning old Fury, I値l try the whole case and condemn you to death.・ ...

Sara Paretsky is the author of eleven other novels, including the bestselling Tunnel Vision, Guardian Angel, and Burn Marks. She lives in Chicago with her husband.

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