I protest.

Son of the return of TIA.

I'll bet you thought that "Total Information Awareness" was dead, after Congress killed it by refusing to fund the program. Well, it has just changed appearance and is now back as, believe it or not, "The Matrix:" What Is The Matrix? ACLU Seeks Answers on New State-Run Surveillance Program.

It appears that the bastards are still trying to spy on American citizens, now using something that they call the "Multistate Anti-Terrorism Information Exchange." (Which if you ask me really spells out "MATIE," but they insist that it's called "Matrix.") This thing is TIA on a state level. It started in Florida, which reminds me that I heard something about it a few weeks ago. The ACLU is now filing a Freedom of Information Act request at the federal level as well as in seven different states, demanding that they own up about this thing. As ACLU Technology and Liberty Program Director Barry Steinhardt says,

"Congress killed the Pentagon's 'Total Information Awareness' data mining program, but now the federal government is trying to build up a state-run equivalent," … "In essence, the government is replacing an unpopular Big Brother initiative with a lot of Little Brothers," he added, noting that the program is receiving $12 million from the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security.

The ACLU wants to find out

what information sources the system is drawing on — information program officials have refused to disclose — as well as who has access to the database and how it is being used.

Should you care about this? Well, consider that if you have a credit history, a driver's license, if you've been married or divorced, if you have a Social Security number, they almost certainly have a dossier with your name on it. That dossier can be searched by the FBI and state police, among others, but, worse, it is being used along with millions of others for fishing expeditions by bureaucrats looking for "terrorist" or "criminal" activity.

I don't know about you, but that idea gives me a cold chill.

But that's not even the worst of it.

Raising even more issues, the Matrix is operated by a private company, Seisint Inc. of Boca Raton, Florida. Ironically, the company's founder was forced to resign after information about his own past came to light: according to Florida police, he was formerly a drug smuggler who had piloted multiple planeloads of cocaine from Colombia to the U.S.

Doesn't that give you a warm fuzzy feeling?

Nope, me neither.