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Issue #4 04-05-00 @ 4:43 AM(cst)

In This Issue
Proposed Privacy Rules Debated
==>by Steven Leahy
Judge Bork decries ''Legal Globalism''
==>by Steven Leahy

Plus -- The Quote of the Day


Proposed Privacy Rules Debated


Steven Leahy
Legislators and industry representatives argued over the details under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley financial services bill passed by Congress last year to codify the privacy rights of consumers financial data.

The Clinton Administration proposed rules that require financial institutions to:

· clearly state their privacy policies;

· provide methods for consumers to ''opt-out'' if personally identifiable is disclosed to third parties.

· ensure the security of financial data, and

· protect data from unauthorized access or use.

Privacy advocates insist that the regulations require consumers to ''opt-in'' and give their consent BEFORE nonpublic personally identifiable data is shared with any third party.Each side predicts dire consequences if the other's proposals are implemented. Privacy advocates predict that the elderly and the least fortunate among us will be targeted under the ''opt-out'' rules. While industry advocates forecast injury to the middle class and small business if the ''opt-in'' policy is enacted.

Read the Story


Judge Bork decries ''Legal Globalism'


Steven Leahy
Judge Robert Bork told an audience at the American Enterprise Institute that a move toward International laws ''may be capable of changing our Constitution.'' As an example, Judge Bork pointed to a recent opinion by Supreme Court Justice Stephen Bryer.

The opinion concerned the length of time that an inmate may be held on death row before execution. Justice Bryer suggested that the Court should be guided, in part, by the decisions by the Privy Council of Jamaica, the Supreme Courts of India and the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe.

''I'm not sure why the Constitution of the United States, which has its own history and understood meaning, should be affected in any way by what foreign courts have to say about their constitutions,'' Bork said.

''International law about the use of armed force should not inhibit America's actions in its own interests,'' Bork said. ''We should not, through globalization, surrender our interests to nations of far different cultures and views of politics, not to mention to nations that are overtly hostile to the United States.''

Bork also pointed out the hypocrisy in a system that detains and punishes some leaders of countries on ''humanitarian grounds'' while leaving other, more murderous leaders (e.g. China), untouched.

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Quote of the Day

When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute -- and it's longer than any hour. That's relativity.

==>Albert Einstein

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