A uniformed federal police force
Not sure how I missed this one, but it came over the transom from sabinbailey...
According to TalkLeft, "Section 605 of the House version of the Patriot Act renewal legislation... calls for the creation of a Federal Police Force."
The section creates: "A permanent police force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service Uniformed Division,'" empowered to "make arrests without warrant for any offense against the United States committed in their presence" ... "or for any felony cognizable under the laws of the United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such felony."
While that doesn't sound too terribly different from what you and I know as "the police," the language is, you have to admit, disturbingly vague (what the hell is an "offense against the United States" and who decides... apparently they do) and the necessity, unspecified.
A TalkLeft reader with knowledge of such matters writes that Uniformed Secret Service have been around for a while, protecting embassies and the like, but that "I guess the amendment intends to make the Uniformed Division national in scope... So its not a novel idea, just an expansion of a force already in place." Sure, but why? (TalkLeft)
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