BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn

Subject: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 10:44 AM

Interesting article:

Along with the usual reminders to hold the noise down and pay overdue fines, library patrons in Santa Cruz are seeing a new type of sign these days: a warning that records of the books they borrow may wind up in the hands of federal agents.

The signs, posted in the 10 county branches last week and on the library's Web site, also inform the reader that the USA Patriot Act "prohibits library workers from informing you if federal agents have obtained records about you."

click here for the rest of it.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 10:58 AM

Yup. The American Library Association and librarians in general have been concerned about the Patriot Act since about the day after it was passed (I'm a librarian). The FBI, etc. say that there are sufficient guarantees built into the Act to protect the Rights given in the Constitution, but librarians aren't as stupid as some folks seem to think. ALA is fighting this, but being against such things gets you branded as a traitor and, let's face it, ALA doesn't have deep pockets even with the support of the ACLU.

Sometimes, these days, librarians seem to stand alone in many areas.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 11:16 AM

And watch that Kroger card too!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Kim C
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 11:32 AM

I haven't been to the library in ages. I'm one of those weird people who likes to BUY books. The last two books I bought were: Chinese Brush Painting, by Kwan Jin, and Eighty Appalachian Songs by Cecil Sharp.

Pretty subversive material. Especially the Chinese book. I might paint flowers or something.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Amos
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 12:27 PM

Well, I get kinda tempted to go to the library and take out a mess of interesting titles like "Al Queda White Pages -- Who's Who in the Islamic Underground", and "Aluminum, Uranium and You -- Centrifuging at Home for Fun and Profit!", and maybe "Take Me to Cuba -- the Hijackers Ultimate Handbook" or maybe even a nice mystery novel like "T is for Terror" or "The Cat Who Stole a Jetliner".

But I might get in trouble, huh, even if I could find them...

A

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 12:40 PM

I use the library regularly, and I've notice that they have a record of the books I check out. I'm essentially a "grazer" -- I check out as many at a time as they will let me get out the door with, sometimes 20. I like to grab all the "new" books on special display, and then check out the "returned book" rack to see what everybody else has been reading. In the past I've checked out just about every book they have on various types of gardening and music. My list is so eclectic as to be essentially meaningless. (Except that the cooking books are conspicuous by their absence!)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 12:47 PM

Wll, I don't think of it as a threat based on what most of us would be reading, but another of those removals of our freedom. By our self-assurances that nothing we read will be of interest to the FBI, are we sending tacit approval for the government to continue to take away our freedoms?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Kim C
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 01:20 PM

The library has always had some kind of record of the books we check out. They have to, otherwise they wouldn't know where to look for books that don't come back when they're supposed to.

The FBI getting involved, now, that's a little different...

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 01:59 PM

Maybe libraries do keep records of books we have checked out. I dunno. Of course, books that are currently 'out' are tagged to the last known borrower, but I thought the info gets wiped afterward.

In the 'old' days, the days of the rental card in the pocket of each book, each borrower's signature was on each card. It was kind of fun to see who else had checked it out. (And sometimes I found that I myself had checked it out a year or two before.)

It's my impression that the library does NOT have a list of the hundreds and hundreds of books I have checked out in the last 15 years. If they do, I myself would like a list.

Rapaire, as a librarian, do you know how I'd go about finding my list?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 02:21 PM

Ebbie, I sure do!

First, think of everything you've read. Second, write it down.

Any library on an automated system (as far as I know, and I'm familiar with the larger systems) maintains a record of who has what checked out ONLY as long as that person has it checked out (and usually for a short time afterwards, in case the item is found to be damaged -- say, 10 days). The record of who checked the item out is wiped when someone else checks out the item. Briefly, the library only knows (or cares) who has an item as long as the item is checked out (plus a bit, usually determined by the library).

For 99.9% of library patrons, there is no record, no list, of what any patron has checked out in the past.

About that 0.1% -- that's the homebound folks, those who for one reason or another (age, disability, etc.) can't get to the library and the library brings the books to them. Records are maintained on what these people check out because if someone's been homebound for a some time the librarians who do the work don't remember whether or not the patron has read a particular book. Mind you, this is NOT a function of the standard library software, but an additional product that has to be purchased. Lots of libraries don't have such software, or maintain such lists manually. Mind you, not many criminals or terrorists are nonogenerians in wheelchairs....

Of course, if you keep an item, the library will know who took it out. And it is possible that backup tapes could be scanned, but that would only be for a short period as these tapes are reused.

Briefly put: libraries don't maintain records on who took out what for very long. To do so would be too costly in terms of money, staff, and storage, and libraries have a tough enough time making ends meet now.

A library which keeps manual records of circulation might be able to do some such, but you'd have to go through every book. The records aren't kept the way the Justice Dept. would like them, I guess. Helping the cops hasn't been part of the library's mission in the past. 8-)

However -- your email is another story. THAT doesn't have to be read at the point where it's created, but can be read at any server between the point of creation and its destination.

Librarians are just pissed off about the erosion of rights...we all should be.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 02:35 PM

My library went to a new electronic card system several years ago. When this card is swiped, there is a database of every book I've checked out since they started using the card. I could easily get Mrs. C. or Stephanie or any of the librarians to print out a copy of my database.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: artbrooks
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 02:36 PM

So, the FBI now has legal authority to obtain information that basically doesn't exist? Somehow, that corresponds with the level of much that is coming out of the present Administration...

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Amos
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 02:53 PM

That's it in a nutshell, Art! One of the first laws of the Presidency should be "govern the country you are in, in the world it is in, and not some other imaginary world or country".

This of ocurse sounds terribly naive to those who have jumped out of bed at the sound of the mournful sireens, grabbed there shotguns and stand ready in their nightshirts for the enemy to stand up and be beaten.

I may eat my words, someday, of course, but right now that's how I sees it.


A

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 03:05 PM

******CORRECTION*********

I just talked to Mrs. C at my library -- and they DON'T ahve a record of all the books I've checked out. They just keep a record of current ones out. (Maybe that's the list I saw - or my overdue books - which are usually quite a few!) Sorry for the misrepresentation. But I'm still suspicious that the info can be retrieved.

Here in a small town I sometimes get comments on the books I check out. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 03:50 PM

Thanks for the correction, Mary in Kentucky. I just talked with the reference desk at my local library- and she said that it's just not true- that public libraries don't have the money (a system would have to pay for that kind of storage), the manpower, or the interest, and besides, the Alaska Privacy Act prohibits that kind of activity.

(Thanks, Rapaire. I admire librarians and revere the system!)

As for comments, I also often get into a discussion of individual books I have read or am in the process of checking out. I often recommend a particular book- or conversely tell them something is badly written. These are literate human beings behind the desk and they take pride in being informed. A library is one of my favorite places.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Beccy
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 04:05 PM

Yikes! I don't have anything to hide (Mostly Berenstain Bears books, Clifford the Big Red Dog, The Day Peter Stuyvesant Sailed To Town, etc...) but I don't like this idea one itty bit.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: denise:^)
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 04:16 PM

As much as I don't like the idea, I have to chuckle at someone perusing the list of the books I'd checked out, looking for some dirt...
I happen to enjoy historical fiction--you know, wagon trains, log cabins, one-room schools--not a lot of traitorous activities in these!

This is about the same as when I worked at a middle school, and the computer room aide was reading my e-mail. I knew, because of some of the comments she made to me about places I was going, etc., that I hadn't mentioned at school. I just laughed--if she was trying to find smut, she was checking the WRONG inbox! Just a lot of notes about rehearsal times, contra dances, new tunes to learn (and even the occasional PDF of sheet music--oh, my!)
She must have been SO disappointed!
Well, the feds would be, too...
Denise:^)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 04:50 PM

Well, you see, nobody who wrote the Patriot Act seems to have actually ASKED the librarians if something could be done....

Yeah, we COULD keep a list of everything you've read, but who would pay for the trouble? Another "unfunded mandate" from Washington, requiring local agencies to spend money that they could better spend in some other way, perhaps on building maintenance or buying children's materials?

There are subversive materials in libraries, always has been: "The Communist Manifesto", "The Anarchist's Cookbook" and other comes to mind. I should also mention "The Federalist Papers", "The Constitution of The United States," "The Magna Carta," and one or two others as well. And, of course, "The Bible," "The Quran", "The Tao Tchin" and so on.

Know what the most banned book in history is? The Bible.

Your Public Library: hotbed of subversion, garden of revolution, people's university, cradle of an informed citizenry. It's not just for story hour anymore! (then again, it never was).

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 05:19 PM

Why on earth do any of you think the FBI cares a whit what books you have been reading? Now a suspected terrorist, that's a different story. They might find it pretty revealing and could provide them information they need to help nail him/her.

I do not think the sky is falling on this one.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rustic Rebel
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 05:42 PM

"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation
must begin by subduing the freeness of speech"
   Benjamin Franklin

"Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions.
It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us."
   Supreme Court Justice William O Douglas

The way things are going we'll have to resort to underground libraries in order to read;
Harry Potter series- by JK Rowlings
Of Mice and Men- by John Stienbeck
The Chocolate War- by Robert Cormmir
I Know Why Caged Bird Sings-by Maya Angelou
The Catcher on the Rye- By J.D. Salinger

These books and more are on a book challenged list. Harry Potter is a big one for the book burner's out there. Deals in the occult don't you know.
I think there has always been those people out there trying to suppress knowledge and freedom of speech. The Government keeping it's proverbial 'eye' on us, is another form of repression. Reading Ben Franklin's words could put me on a terrorist list at this stage in their game!
I had just heard they are going to revise the Patriot act- that's all I heard, but I am hopefull that they give up some of this bullshit and return some rights.
Peace. Rustic

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: SINSULL
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 06:02 PM

DougR - because it is none of their god damn business!

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 07:35 PM

In the 1970s the FBI tried to bully librarians into providing patron information -- who reads what -- to them. The general response (including that of those dear little old bun-haired ladies) was, "F**k you, Jack -- get a warrant!" State legislators took note and, as far as I know, passed laws in every state guaranteeing the privacy of library records (unless there was a court order or warrant). The FBI gave up trying to bully librarians.

The Patriot Act still requires a warrant/court order, but makes it far, far easier to get one. Moreover, it makes it possible to use library records as part of a fishing expedition, NOT a search for evidence of an actual crime.

"Whatever you say say nothin'
When you talk about you know what..."

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 11 Mar 03 - 10:24 PM

I'm not sure that there's any restriction or erosion of rights going on here. The public library is a service that the county (or possibly city or state) chooses to provide, and if they want to keep a list of what you check out, that's there business. I don't think that there's any useful information to be gathered, though. Anyone who checks out books on chemical synthesis or airline piloting when planning a terrorist attack probably isn't going to be succesful in the first place.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 12:54 AM

Rapaire: in the 1970's we were not faced with the terrorist threat we are faced with now.

Sinsull: so you think it would not be helpful for the FBI to have information about a suspected terrorist that might help them apprehend them? It's "none of their God Damn business?" I repeat: the FBI doesn't give a damn about what a Mudcatter reads at the public library, unless said Mudcatter is a suspected terrorist (which I seriously doubt). It is, in my opinion, a tempest in a teapot.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 01:08 AM

Until they decide that all Arabs are suspicious, as they are already doing. Or, they decide all Hispanics, Norwegians, Scots, Irish, Panamanian...you get the idea, Doug?

It's the erosion of privacy and rights, NOT what we are reading!!!

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 07:40 AM

As an ex-librarian I like the idea of a law saying librarians will have to tell the authorities what the patrons (all or selected) are reading AND the law-makers not checking to see if they keep the info.

I have enjoyed this thread - like Mary I borrow widely (I love the return trolley!) & also enjoyed the comment from Forum Lurker that any terrorist borrowing a book on a suspicious subject would not be very efficient.

It's a sad comment on our modern world that people like your Bush & our little Johnny can help create such an atmosphere of suspicion & hatred.

Fortunately there are folks who ridicule them, hold them up for what they are & fight against them. Long may they live & prosper.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 08:20 AM

DougR, there is a world of difference between "Let's see what might be there" and "We want specific information on...." After all, people are supposed to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures. And I understand that no warrant is supposed to be issued except with probable cause and the warrant is supported by an oath, and it specifically describes the place to be searched and the people or things to be taken or searched for.

As for terrorism in the late '60s and '70s, the FBI was fishing for "student activists" of the SDS or Weather Underground -- and for those who might have demonstrated against the VN war or against Tricky Dicky.

If anyone doesn't think that what you're reading matters, why then are you reading it?

But I'll give you a hypothetical case: a mayor is up for re-election and it's a close race. She's taking a course in social problems at a local college, on her own time and to increase her knowledge. As part of the course she checks out material on lesbian culture. Her opponent learns that she is reading this stuff (that's a technical librarian-type word). It doesn't matter to him *why* she's reading it -- it's obvious that she is a lesbian instead of the conservative, family-oriented sort her ads proclaim her to be.

If you doubt this sort of thing could happen, don't.

I suggest reading the book "Arsenals of a Democratic Culture." It's an old book, written right after WWII, but gives a terrific overview of the changing views and roles of the public library in society. If you can find it, that is. You may have to get it on interlibary loan.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Forum Lurker
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 11:12 AM

Rapaire-while that is certainly a possibility, very few opponents willing to use such a strategy would wait until they had something credible to use, but would simply make the attack through a "non-affiliated" third-party sponsor. Besides, I should hope that the FBI is beyond accusing suspected terrorists of homosexuality.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 11:16 AM

I'd like to thank Rapaire for so zealously guarding my rights. I may not be a terrorist, but if I decide to murder my wife and collect the insurance, there may be some books in the library that will help me bring that about. In that case, I would be very happy to know that Katlaughing and Rapaire have erased the records of my having checked out books on poisons, or poisonous mushrooms, or how to get a new identity and move to a Caribbean Island, or Forensic Evidence. As a potential murderer, it's comforting to know that any nosy cop who wonders why my wife is suddenly dead will be met by a dear little bun-haired old lady who will say "F**k You, get a warrant." The rest of the murderers and I are real happy that the records of any books we check out will be expunged to keep those nosy cops from using them as evidence.

What's really cool about the whole thing is the people who want to expunge those records in the name of protecting everybody's rights all share the ludicrous notion that cops have time to go on fishing expeditions for random terrorists or murderers.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 12:30 PM

Sandra in Australia: it boggles my mind why you and so many others blame Bush and Blair for the current problems. You evidently do not credit Saddam at all for being responsible, right? If that is your position, then I think that you and the others are contributing to the emasculation of the United Nations, the one institution that so many of you hold so dear. Want to know why? Because any country can snub it's nose at the U. N. anytime a Resolution by the Security Council is lodged against it for any reason and get by with it.

I think Lep is right in that the police and the FBI have far more important things to do than check on what books I check out at the library.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 01:54 PM

I don't think Leprechaun is saying that the criminal authorities have more important things to do than to check on what books you are reading. He is saying the opposite.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 02:39 PM

No, no, you miss the point! Libraries cannot now and never have been able to tell anyone what books you've read! What you have checked out now, yes. What you own money on, yes. But it is NOT possible to provide a list to ANYONE, even yourself, of everything you've read or checked out in the past. Libraries don't have the time, staff or money for such. Besides, they always have and always will continue to cooperate with law enforcement (or anyone else) with a warrant or court order for the records.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 03:12 PM

If it doesn't matter what you have read, why mention it specifically in the Patriot Act?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 12 Mar 03 - 11:52 PM

Ebbie I don't have time to check out what somebody's reading if they're suspected of selling heroin. If a specific person kills somebody and we develop probable cause on that specific person, we'll make the time. If I find a book report or a photo of a specific book at a crime scene, I might try to find out who checked out that book, in which case accurate records might come in handy. It would be a long shot even if such databases were kept.

But the idea that I might go searching databases to figure out who's reading subversive literature and then hunt them down and oppress them is just a ridiculous paranoid fantasy. For one thing, my bosses aren't willing to pay me the overtime, and I sure as hell wouldn't do anything that boring for free.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 12:03 AM

Trust me - little sage-walking-kitty

It is more than your library card that is being watched!

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

However, a puff of herbal smoke combined with a mystic Indian incantation spoken within the healing-circle can render you invisible to all....if you so desire.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 12:14 AM

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,terilu
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 12:55 AM

I think it's a 1984/Farenheit 451/Brave New World/X-Files/People's History/Handmaid's Tale/Steal This Book!/UtneReader/Resurgence/Mother Jones/Daily Worker/Yes!/Mother Earth News kind of plot, and also a way to keep all these FBI people busy and earning their keep! Hey, you never know when another terrorist might be hiding out in your local library.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 06:36 AM

Lep, I'm not worried about the local cops -- I get along well with them (even gave them a Class IIA protective vest, but how I came by one is a long, long story -- PM me if you want to know). Heck, I've worked with them on several things in several places and, for a while, was MP/CID in the Army. It's the Fibbys who bug librarians. The local folks are too busy (as are the state cops), too underfunded (like the libraries), and too smart.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 05:48 PM

People who say, "Lighten up, folks. If you're not doing anything wrong, then you don't have anything to worry about," simple haven't a clue. They'll get the clue in spades when they get their butts hauled in for interrogation and suddenly discover that what they didn't think was wrong, someone else does.

Of course they're confident that it will never happen. Well, we'll see. . . .

The point is not that it will happen, but that it can happen. And if it can happen, it might happen.

Also, it violates the Fourth Amendment.

". . . damned inconvenient, that Constitution, so let's just ignore it. . . ."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 07:09 PM

Well Don, I am one of those folks, and yes I'm scared to death.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 09:35 PM

I believe J. Edgar Hoover got a lot of information on a lot of people who weren't doing illegal things, and used it for his personal vendettas. Martin Luther King, and the actress Jean Seberg for two.

Trusting in the goodwill of authorities is foolish. They are very likely to use information for their own benefit; too bad if it isn't yours. That is why we are supposed to have a rule of law, not of men.

How old is that saying: "Who shall watch the watchmen?" (I forget the Latin).

There is a young Saudi student at the University of Idaho who is now being investigated by the FBI. And he is apparently not a "suspected terrorist;" he is being charged with visa fraud and making false statements.

Part of the "evidence" against him is that he has pictures ot the Trade Center towers and of Osama bin Laden on his computer. Well, so do I, and so do many of us. Pictures like that aren't evidence; they're propaganda. But they make him look bad to many people, and innocent or guilty, he's going to have a rough time.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Mar 03 - 10:08 PM

I heard a song long ago. I think it was from The People's Songbook. The chorus was something like

Who's going to investigate
The man who investigates
The man who investigates me?

Good question.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 12:36 AM

Clint: Well? Is the student guilty of visa fraud?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 05:03 AM

He must be innocent, or the government wouldn't be investigating him. Doug, you've been on the mudcat long enough to have learned that nobody in the government ever does anything in good faith. If you would learn a lesson from all your friends on the mudcat, you would realize that the only reason anybody ever works for the FBI or the CIA or any other governmental entity is so they can oppress innocent people and perpetrate injustice.

Why, I'll bet they even have ongoing training for that.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: fat B****rd
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 06:02 AM

So the "flagging" of library tickets in the film "Seven" was accurate.Many years ago I reserved "The Anarchist's Cookbook" at my local library innocently thinking it would be full of fish and brown rice recipes. Apparently not......

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 08:48 AM

A library I worked at bought the "Anarchist's Cookbook" because they were short of materials on the governmental theory of Anarchy. They also bought, for some reason, "The Poor Man's James Bond."

The Director had a fit, kittens, and other things. The books ended up in Reference (non-circulating) and were stolen within a week.

I once had to buy books on explosives due to patron requests (an engineering company). No sweat -- I bought books on the engineering use of explosives: formulae for calculalting the charges need to cut steel of various types and forms, slurry hole configuration for various strengths of heaving explosives in road construction and so on. I think that they were checked out once in five years....

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Hollowfox
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 11:14 AM

Hey, Repaire, welcome to that most exaulted group, Mudcat Librarians!

Now for the rest of you lot, I'll let you in on a few things:

The Privacy of the Patron (that's you) is almost a religion to librarians; it's part of library school training. It's fused to hte idea that you can read whatever you want or need, if we can possibly provide it. We were given some examples for this:
One was where there had been a rash of cattle mutilations in Colorado (sorry, I don't have dates or locale to verify this, but it was the example given in class), and local police wanted the names of everyone who had checked out any occult books in the recent past. The library said "no", because simply checking out a book on any subject is not proof that the person is going to use the information in the book.
The other was an experiment done by a (male) library student, again, I'm sorry I don't have names or dates. He dressed himself "to look like an Anachist" (teacher's phrase. Knowing Utah Phillips, I bristled) and traveled to various libraries of different sizes. He asked for help in finding books, starting with general questions that led to his "need" for books on explosives, bomb building, etc. He found that most places had little, if anything on these subjects (no surprise), but that none of the librarians balked at the questions or withheld any information that they did have (this was checked on later).
We were also given the example that someone checking out all the library's books on suicide could be doing research on the subject, not contemplating suicide.

Remember folk, when the troops come in, the teachers, librarians and folksingers are among the first ones shot by the opressors.

Hollowfox the Dangerous *wicked grin*

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 12:12 PM

Lep: I keep forgetting that. Thanks for nudging me. I'll try to remember that from now on. :>)

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 12:53 PM

And bookstore owners, Hollowfox, ala The Tattered Cover in Denver the owner of which refused to give client info to the FBI and won her case!

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: MMario
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 12:54 PM

Mylocal bookstore wouldn't know who had purchased what book anyway!

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Hollowfox
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 03:53 PM

Yeah, Ka. Just another reason to pay cash an avoid credit cards. *g*

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Fred Miller no cookie
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 06:52 PM

Well, some of the stuff I've checked out would make your hair stand on end like quills upon the fretful porcupine, and since the library can't keep track, I'll have to recall as best I can, so I can tell anyone who wants to know. Maybe I should keep a list to post in my trash. If anybody cares, let them. Somebody tell me the worst thing I could possibly get, and I promise I'll try to find it--if I don't have it already.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 14 Mar 03 - 10:08 PM

Sorry DougR, I just got back. You ask

Clint: Well? Is the student guilty of visa fraud?

He hasn't been tried yet. He may be. He may be guilty of worse. Or he may not even spit on the sidewalk.

But that's not the point. I'm talking ethics: fairness. I'm just an elderly country boy but I believe the United States is supposed to be an example of justice and liberty; we are supposed to be better than the bad guys. We are supposed to give the bad guys a trial according to the rules because we are the good guys.

I subscribe to the National Review, I've got some guns, used to be an NRA member, but it don't make me guilty of being a Republican. I also subscribe to the Progressive, and write these anti-administration posts but it don't make me guilty of being disloyal to the country. What I check out of the library, subscribe to, or watch on TV or the 'net don't mean I'm guilty -- or innocent --of anything and is nobody's damn business but mine.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 03:22 AM

Well, Clint, maybe there's a judge in Idaho you need to straighten out on how things are supposed to be done. It's damn nice of you to give that poor Saudi student the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he'll luck out and get a bunch of folks on the jury who've already made up their minds like you.

Bullshit, you have too.

But if you take one of your guns and go hire yourself out to kill somebody, that Soldier of Fortune magazine you subscribe to sure as hell is gonna be evidence whether you think so or not.

So what if you don't subscribe to Soldier of Fortune magazine and so what if you don't hire yourself out to kill people. If you're growing marijuana, the stack of High Times magazines is evidence. If you're buggering little boys, your NAMBLA literature is evidence.

If you're not doing anything to draw the attention of your hated authorities, I know this will break your heart, but nobody's gonna pay any attention to you or your reading list. You're just not important enough. You'll have to find some other way to satisfy your oppression fantasies.

The hell you don't.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,clint keller
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 02:46 PM

leprechaun--

Haven't made up my mind about guilt or innocence. Don't have enough information, all I hear is things like "He has pictures of bin Laden" on one side and "The community likes him," on the other. Neither of those statements are evidence for or against visa fraud, or any crime. Are they?

Have made up my mind about the difference between evidence and opinions/propaganda.

Wasn't criticizing judges, was criticizing the FBI & the media.

But I do recall the courts in this country used to consider people innocent until proven guilty, back when I was a boy. You don't like that? It was one of the ways we considered ourselves superior to the French, who presumed the accused were guilty.

I don't quite follow your reasoning about the magazines. Are you saying that if I were Republican, reading the National Review would be evidence of it, and if I were not Republican it wouldn't? If that's it, I think that's close to my point, though I'd say something like "symptom" instead of "evidence."

What I was getting at was that both innocent and guilty people (or Republicans and independents) may read the same things. Not true?

clint

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 03:10 PM

If you think the fellow won't get a fair trial, you are directly criticizing the judge, whose responsibility it is to ensure a fair trial.

If the charge is an immigration violation, then photos of Bin Laden won't be relevant, and the judge won't allow it to be presented to the jurors.

The presumption of innocence is for courts, judges and jurors, and I don't understand why you think it isn't being applied in this case. Cops and prosecutors do not have to presume innocence, or else nobody ever gets charged with anything.

It looks like you've presumed the court there in Idaho is guilty of trashing the constitution.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 04:37 PM

It looks to me (and I'm only a librarian) that for a long time we've been making several mistakes.

First, "innocent until proven guilty" doesn't apply to the police. It applies to court proceedings, and only in criminal cases. Defense attorneys will work with every (legal) means they have to prove their client not guilty; the prosecutor, representing the people, will do the same for guilt. The judge is there to referee and insure fair administration of justice.

Secondly, the police enforce the laws. They do not assume guilt or innocence, but follow the trail of evidence to its logical conclusion. At that point, the prosecutor and the defense attorneys take over. If you think the law is wrong or a bad law, change it by legislative action or judical review -- cops, prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges have as much say about the content of the law as the checkout clerk in the supermarket has about the prices the store charges.

Thirdly, the fact that I wouldn't provide the police of any sort with certain library records (and not all library records are privileged) UNLESS they had a warrant or court order for the records doesn't mean that I wouldn't work with the police in other matters. I can and I have. And if the police were to come in with a warrant for your records I'd provide them -- just as you would provide tax records if the IRS came 'round with a warrant.

Yeah, yeah, I know that there are bad cops and bad lawyers and bad judges. I've aware of King Richard I's remark that "the police aren't here to create disorder, the police are here to PRESERVE disorder." I've aware of railroaded prisoners and that Joe Hill was innocent. But unless we work towards an ideal we'll never achieve anything except to trudge around in the same old vicious circles.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 05:30 PM

leprechaun,

My presumption is that the feds are trying to influence public opinion, and thus, perhaps, the judges. It didn't work on the judge who refused their request to hold the student without bail. I do not criticise the judge, or assume that the student will be tried unfairly. (By the way, I believe he is still being held by the INS.)

But I wasn't primarily talking about that, even. I was criticizing bad thinking, and using the news releases as an example. I could have use the words of an American Legionnaire I read in the 50's who said every American should hate anyone accused of being Communist.

Accused of being. Note that.

It's not just the courts that should assume innocence; any decent person should assume innocence until proven wrong.

As I said, "What I was getting at was that both innocent and guilty people (or Republicans and independents) may read the same things. Not true?"

Rapaire says "the police... do not assume guilt or innocence" and it seemed to me that the FBI was violating that principle and assuming guilt on scant evidence.

Again, I was criticizing bad thinking, criticizing confusing the map with the territory as the semantics people say, criticizing the confusing of fact with opinion, criticizing the claiming of guilt by association with certain words & pictures.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Ebbie
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 05:54 PM

Rapaire, "And if the police were to come in with a warrant for your records I'd provide them ". What records? I think you were saying that the library systems doesn't keep records? Do you mean library card information: Date of first use, social security number, home address and phone number? Or do you mean, frequency of use, type of checkout subject(s), public demeanor?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 08:08 PM

I think what Rapaire was saying was the library doesn't keep a database of books checked out by patrons. I can only thnk of very rare occasions when such a databse would be useful to investigators. For instance, when a suspect is known to frequent a particular library, and there is independant evidence to suggest that his or her reading habits are relevant to a specific crime.

Like maybe: "The witness advised the assailant was quoting Dr. Suess."

With computers being used as they are now, it should be as easy to keep such a database as it is for Home Depot or Safeway to have a record of all their customers' sales transactions. Rapaire says libraries aren't doing that yet, so any subpoena for records would have to be satisifed with biographical information, phone numbers, possibly addresses, and currently checked out materials.

As far as using such a (as yet non-existent) database for a random fishing expedition, to find out who's checking out the Anarchist Cookbook, for example, that would seem to be a waste of time in any event. For the very reasons Clint mentions, you're just as likely to snag a curious Republican, or a slightly confused chef, or student with a research project.

If your assignment is to look for subversives, there are just too many fishing holes that would be more productive. The local health food store for instance - "I have a Duces Tecum subpoena for your list of all the people who have purchased alfalfa sprouts in the last six months."

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 08:36 PM

I'd provide whatever records the warrant or court order specified **to the best of my ability.** If the data doesn't exist it can't be provided and nobody can wish it into existence. And with most (all, as far as I know) library autormation systems not collecting a history of what a patron checks out, the data wouldn't be there to provide.

Check out your state laws: most have laws which protect the privacy of library circulation records (such as those records are).

Were I one of the nasties, I'd worry more about the web-based email I sent from the library's public computers. THAT can be intercepted and read from servers outside of the library, or, WITH THE PROPER WARRANTS, copies diverted to the authorities as it is sent from the library's servers (picture a Y, with one branch going to the FBI and the other to the person addressed).

There is NO privacy on either the World Wide Web OR the Internet in general. NONE. ZIP. NADA. ZERO. Even encrypted messages can and have been broken. If you want to send a private message, send it via the post office and put cello tape over the envelope flaps (might not keep it private, but makes it much more difficult to open undetected, according to MI5).

And, by the way, cell phones are one of the LEAST secure means to send info. Use a land line -- but even there privacy is relative.

Lep is right: local cops, even state cops, aren't likely to want to check out library records except in extraordinary circumstances. A gung-ho FBI rookie is a different story, however.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 08:43 PM

Just to let you know, the person at the library's server can also see every single website visited from any of the library's computers, public and staff.

Using Solaris, for instance, you enter the command "snoop" at root, or, if you can't read that fast, "snoop | more" and periodically press the space bar. Or enter "snoop > filename" and save it all to a file. Or do any of a bunch of other things.

Why I would want to do this, though, is beyond me. I can look at enough junk websites all by myself.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Mar 03 - 08:56 PM

Oh, okay Ebbie.

I could tell them your name, address, phone number, work phone or other phone numbers, possibly your email address, what you have checked out, whether or not you owe for overdues and how much, what items you might have said you've lost or claimed to have returned and not paid for or otherwise settled, various notes about you that the staff might have put in ("Likes to read romance novels" or "One really nasty person" or "Says to let her daughter use her card"), and possibly your date of birth, patron type (resident, nonresident, juvenile, etc. -- not mean, nasty, nice), what items you might have on reserve, if a juvenile what school you go to, and this sort of stuff.

Different libraries collect different info, but this stuff is pretty common to all of them.

I could NOT tell them what items you've checked out and returned in past, nor could I tell them if you had checked out a particular item (unless you had returned it within a few days and no one else had checked it out).

Hope this makes it clearer.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Gareth
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 03:16 PM

Hmmmm ! In present circumstances would C S Forrester's "Death to the French" be subversive or patriotic ???

Gareth :-)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 04:40 PM

Are you sure you're a conservative Doug? What I mean is, you don't really seem to have what I'd see as the essential factor - distrust of innovations.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 05:15 PM

'Swat I've been trying to tell you, McGrath. You liberals depend too much on the definition of a conservative as printed in some dictionary or other. I suspect it was written by a liberal. :>)

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 05:23 PM

The Oxford Dictionary written by a liberal? You're joking.

Now if anyone is a dyed in the wool liberal, Doug...

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 06:14 PM

DougR- the basic definition of a conservative position is being opposed to change. To have a conservative outlook, you need to be opposed to most change, usually on the basis that things are just fine as they are. If not that, how do you define conservative?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 06:39 PM

And a classic liberal is someone who believes the job of government is to hold the ring, so that free enterprise can do as it wishes.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 16 Mar 03 - 11:18 PM

McGrath-That depends on your side of the pond. America views liberal as meaning in favor of change, which in our case is more restriction on free enterprise.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 03:24 AM

I think it is a bit presumptious, Forum Lurker, for you to say what "America" defines a liberal or a conservative as. I stand by my statement that I don't think that either, in today's politics can be defined as Webster defines it. Some would say Senator McCain is conservative, others would say he is "moderate" (whatever that is) and others liberal. I think it is a waste of time to try to pigeon hole either.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 10:50 AM

DougR-I have never seen a definition of liberal which varies considerably from that used in the context of American politics. I don't think it's particularly presumptious to say that a definition most people agree with is a fair shot at a usable definition.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: MMario
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 10:54 AM

I'd agree with liberal = in favour of change - but not on the restriction of free enterprise -

from where I sit that is far more often the pervue of conservatives.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 11:03 AM

MMario-when I say restrictions on free trade, I mean that liberals dislike a laissez faire approach, and want constraints that prevent businesses from exploiting the citizenry.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 11:16 AM

Okay, I'll toss this
into the discussion of "liberal" and "conservative." (After all, part of a library's function is to help ensure an informed electorate.)

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 17 Mar 03 - 05:49 PM

Well, I like to think I'm liberal, but I don't think I'm " A Liberal." I'm also conservative about a lot of things, but I don't think I'm "A Conservative."

I am, amazingly, with DougR when he says "I think it is a waste of time to try to pigeon hole either."

Terms like Liberal, Conservative, Art and Folk music are useful for discussion as long as the discussors (is that a word?) can agree on the definitions beforehand. Arguing about what a word "really " means is futile. Look what's happened to "gay" over the centuries.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Sam L
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 10:15 AM

Wow, this turned into the olde What is a conservative? thread.

I was going to mention about cell phone privacy that I'd heard Heddy Lamarr's old patent might be revived by some companies to shift frequencies in irregular patterns. A silent film babe, she invented a national security technology to scramble radio messages in shifting frequencies, tracked on ribbons of paper. I read about it in the library. And they also have pictures of her in old film books wearing these coiled snake-things on her breasts. Yow. Hard to tell whether I was being subversive or perversive, checking her out.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 03:01 PM

Thread-drifty nit-pick:— Silent film babe? Babe, yes, but Hedy Lamarr (b. Nov. 9, 1913, d. Jan. 19, 2000) was considerably after the "talkies" came in. Voici!

Hedy's credited invention was for a radio guiding system for torpedoes which was used in WWII. She supposedly gained the knowledge from her first husband, Fritz Mandl, a Viennese munitions dealer who sided with the Nazis. Hedy drugged her maid to escape her husband and homeland.

I'll never forget her performance as the steamy "half-breed" seductress in White Cargo (1942). To bring it back to the subject of the thread, you might be able to check the video out from your local library. I wonder what the thought-police might make of it. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 03:09 PM

More on Hedy:— If you're driven nuts by people around you and their damned cell phones, blame it on Hedy. She wasn't just a sex-pot. < a href= http://www.astr.ua.edu/4000WS/didyouknow.1.html>"One ringy-dingy . . . Two ringy-dingies. . . ."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 03:12 PM

"One ringy-dingy . . . Two ringy-dingies. . . ."

There. That's better.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 03:15 PM

Do bookshops have to give the FBI details of all their sales as well?

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 04:03 PM

In theory, yes. That's what the law says. But although most of the bookstores I shop in keep records of what they've sold for purposes of knowing what, when, and how many to re-order, they don't keep records of who bought what. You pick up the book you want off the shelf, take it to the cash register, hand the clerk your money, they put it in a bag, you thank each other, and you walk out. Unless you shop with a credit card or pay by check, there is no reason for you to give your name. Some of them don't even know the names of their regular customers. If you special-order something, they might ask for you name, address, and phone number so they can notify you when your order comes in, but after the transaction, there's no point in their keeping any record of it.

I don't see how the FBI can enforce this without putting a huge record-keeping burden on bookstores. Most of the bookstore owners and personnel that I'm acquainted with are very much into First Amendment (freedom of speech and of the press) issues and would dig their heels in. Attempts at this kind of snooping is bound to meet heavy resistance or outright civil disobedience. The same with libraries and librarians. My wife works in the Seattle Public Library and a good friend owns a bookstore, so I think I have a finger on the pulse.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 04:43 PM

So far booksellers are safe, due to the heroic stand of Joyce Meskis, owner of the Tattered Cover Bookstore in Denver. You can read an article about the court finding in her favour for refusing to hand over records when police handed her a search warrant by clicking here. Also, if you put the bookstore name in google, you will see her website, plus another one, I think it is IOBA's site, whcih has an extensive interview with her. She is truly a hero(ine) of the First Amendment.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: GUEST,Fred Miller
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 06:19 PM

Oops, yes, I slipped, doing a passing parody of a mike myers "babes of all time" bit. Thanks Don.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Rapparee
Date: 18 Mar 03 - 07:42 PM

I don't remember much about it, but I recently read an Associate Press story on a bookstore in (I think) Boston which trashed all of its "who bought it" records so that the FBI couldn't get the info. Now they will keep such information ONLY if the customer asks that it be kept. Most bookstores (all that I know of) don't care who bought what.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 19 Mar 03 - 10:20 AM

If the FBI really wants to find out the views of most 'catters, they'd find it easiest to surf the forum.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: DougR
Date: 20 Mar 03 - 01:55 AM

True, Dave, true.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: leprechaun
Date: 21 Mar 03 - 12:15 AM

Katguffawing - That lady isn't a heroin. In this case, she's a methamphetamine. And it appears the Colorado Supreme Court is as full of shit as the Oregon Supreme Court, and the ninth Circuit Court.

Subject: RE: BS: FBI & Your Library Card - Libraries Warn
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Mar 03 - 12:49 AM

lepreconning? Not sure I understand what you mean? :->