CNET NEWS.COM By Declan McCullagh - Internet privacy loses a voice in D.C..
WASHINGTON--Georgia Rep. Bob Barr is an irascible conservative, an unyielding foe of abortion, gay marriage, and any drug more potent than nicotine. A floor manager during Bill Clinton's impeachment, Barr had lobbied for the president's ouster long before anyone knew of an intern's unfortunate affections inside the Oval Office.
Yet even Naderites should recognize that Barr's defeat in Georgia's Republican primary last week removes the fiercest champion of privacy in the U.S. House of Representatives, and his electoral loss will be a gain for the surveillance state.
As a member of the influential House Judiciary Committee, which oversees criminal laws, Barr has been in a unique position to advance privacy-friendly proposals while thwarting his opponents' more heinous schemes. Barr tried to limit government snooping on Americans' bank accounts (it failed, in a 129-299 vote), successfully campaigned for more oversight of the FBI's Carnivore monitoring system, and opposed a plan to let police obtain customer records from Internet providers and telephone companies without search warrants.
In 1999, Barr, a former CIA analyst, pressed for hearings to investigate the extent of the National Security Agency's shadowy Echelon surveillance network. "If Congress doesn't exercise regular as well as periodic oversight, then agencies are going to get away with as much as they can," he told me at the time.
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Barr says he's not giving up the privacy fight. "It's an issue that has been very close to my heart during the entire time that I've been in the Congress," Barr said last Friday. "A lot of it stems from the fact that I've been a prosecutor and I've been at the CIA and I know from prior public service just how powerful government is. It's given me a very healthy skepticism of giving government more and more power."
Barr is an unusual political phenomenon: An unapologetic Republican--boasting a 100 percent voting rating from the Christian Coalition and a zero percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters--who frequently allies with left-leaning groups on privacy topics. The American Civil Liberties Union applauds his approach to privacy, and even the liberal diehards at People for the American Way say they agree with Barr on the invasive nature of "legislation proposed and passed since September 11."
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Libertarians may applaud Barr's suspicion of government eavesdropping, his support of low taxes, and his vigorous defense of Second Amendment rights. But that's about it. [Privacy Digest]
