So the Patriot Act is biting the Tea Baggers on the ass. Awww.

[BlueCaliDem]

37. The Patriot Act under Bush is not the same as the one under President Obama.

There are key differences.

You can agree or disagree with the President on the re-authorization of certain Patriot Act provisions (after they'd been amended to include greater judicial and Congressional oversight in 2006 with Senator Obama's support). You can challenge it on civil liberties grounds. But you cannot deny that since President Obama became president in 2008, hate groups of the Timothy McVeigh type have SURGED.

The Southern Poverty Law Center that monitors hate groups in the United States, said in a letter to U.S. Attorney Eric Holder and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano that patriot groups now hold the potential for a wave of domestic terrorism. The groups overshadow the danger posed by more traditional hate groups - neo-Nazis and others dedicated against blacks, Latinos, Catholics and Muslims, for example, the report found. The group's letter urged federal officials to create a new task force to assess federal resources devoted to the threat.

In October 1994, the law center wrote to then-Attorney General Janet Reno about the growing threat of domestic extremism. The Oklahoma City federal building was bombed six months later.

The law center found 1,360 patriot groups in 2012 – an 813% rise since 2008, the year before Obama took office. Of those groups, 321 constitute militias. The law center also found a near-record 1,007 hate groups with animus directed at minorities, gay men, lesbians, and transgender individuals in 2012. That's a slight decline from the 1,018 groups counted in 2011.

This ain't FDR's America anymore.

I just wonder . . . had there been a Patriot Act during JFK's presidency, would history about this president be different today? And JFK was a White man. Okay, he was the first Catholic president, but he was at least White.