Just in case you have not heard, privacy is now officially dead in America. The drones are coming.
From Fox News:
Unmanned drones could soon be buzzing in the skies above many U.S. cities, as the federal government green-lights the technology for local law enforcement amid widespread privacy concerns.
The Federal Aviation Administration on Monday began to explain the rules of the sky for these newly licensed drones at potentially dozens of sites across the country. The agency, on its website, said that government "entities" will have to obtain a special certificate in order to fly the aircraft, adding that the FAA is "streamlining the process for public agencies to safely fly (drones) in the nation's airspace."
In doing so, the government is taking a tool that has become synonymous with U.S. counterterror warfare in countries like Pakistan and Yemen -- and putting it in the hands of U.S. law enforcement.
Unlike some of the drones used overseas, these will not be equipped with missiles. They are to be used purely for surveillance. But that alone has raised serious privacy concerns on Capitol Hill and beyond.
"Our Founding Fathers had no idea that there would be remote-control drones with television monitors that can feed back live data instantaneously -- but if they had, they would have made darn sure ... that these things were subject to the Fourth Amendment (protecting individual privacy)," Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, told Fox News.
Drones have already been employed domestically. In what was described as the first case where an unmanned drone was used to arrest an American citizen on U.S. soil, a North Dakota SWAT team reportedly borrowed a Department of Homeland Security drone to monitor Rodney Brossart -- who was involved in a 16-hour standoff at his North Dakota farm over six cattle that had wandered onto his property and which he claimed as his own. The SWAT team apparently used the drone to make sure it was safe to arrest him, though his lawyer has since claimed Brossart was subjected to guerrilla-like police tactics and had his constitutional rights violated.
Now, thanks to these drones, privacy will be a thing of the past. The drones can fly, video anything they see, and even peer into your home with thermal imaging.
The Constitution clearly prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. This is an unreasonable search and seizure when the government can fly a drone over your home and just look in, simply because someone wants to.
There is no Constitutional authority for these drones. There are no statutes that allow this or even a court case that says the government can do this.
Drones can have a legitimate role in law enforcement and other uses, such as search and rescue. But those legitimate uses do not strip Americans of their Constitutional rights.
Tags: amendment, constitution, drones, fourth, privacy
Permalink Reply by Old Ga. Dawg on Let's See Now?
Looks Like A Buzzard
Fly's Like A Buzzard
There Fore
Must Be A Buzzard
And Can Be
Shot Down
Like A
BUZZARD.
Permalink Reply by Noreen Adams on Who the Buzzard has has the gut to take em down?
Permalink Reply by OneCitizenOfTheRepublic on Geese? Nope. Skeet? Nope. UFO's...yeah, that's the ticket! 10 gage, double 00 buck shot...not long enough range. 44 mag long riffle? Nope. Hummm... McMillan Tac-50 .50 BMG...suppose you'd have to lead'em a far piece... Guess you could put up barrage balloons /w steel cables (blimps) didn't work so great in WWII. Of course, you could ask the Chinese to give you their hack that they used in Iraq to down one of these peeping drones. But the BEST IDEA...fire the damn Progressives in November and replace them with red-blooded, God-fearing, constitution-loving Americans~~~~
The Predator-B has a maximum altitude 50,000 feet so good luck shooting it down unless you have some SAM's kicking around. There are smaller ones that are currently in use by some police departments. I know that the the Nashville Police department just got 2 (DraganFlyer X6 I think) that have a max altitude of 8,000 feet.
Permalink Reply by Sue Carroll on Sounds reasonable to me!
Permalink Reply by Doug Nicholson on One has been shot down in SC already, although it wasn't being flown by law enforcement. An offshoot of PETA called SHARK was trying to prevent a pigeon shoot on private property. Here's the story and a YouTube video:
Permalink Reply by Robert Bechtel on No limit
They are in use in Texas, Arizona, Florida and Washington States (Predator-B type). The issue that has been raised is they cost about $3,000 and hour to operate and require approximately 1 hour of maintenance for every hour of flight.
Permalink Reply by Jo Gonzalez on Hell, Michael, it is our money, why should they worry? On the Border yes, on individuals, no and Hell no.
Jo
Personally I feel at $3,000 an hour they could hire some more Border Patrol Agents who could actually do something more then take pictures. Or maybe not???
Permalink Reply by Debrajoe Smith-Beatty on Vote out of office every dam incumbent. We still have a constitution and believe me, the elected scum is going to know it.
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