PATRIOT renewed with little change

President Bush signed the PATRIOT act renewal into law ensuring that it wouldn’t expire today. The reauthorization does make a couple of minor changes, but mostly postpones the expiration of certain provisions for another 4 months. Russ Feingold made a statement expressing his concerns and pledged to work towards adding additional safeguards. I’m mostly happy with what’s happened. Libraries are mostly exempted from producing their lending records, and the law still isn’t permanent. It’s a long way from being fixed, but there’s still a chance and that’s a good thing.