FP: Mr. Williams, let me begin with you. The Left has been waging a ferocious war on the Patriot Act. How can anyone justify this behavior at a time when we face such a deadly threat from Islamist terrorists? Shouldn’t minimizing the possibility of another 9/11 tragedy within our borders be our top priority?

Williams: If the Patriot Act actually did something to "minimize the possibility of another 9/11 tragedy within our borders", then perhaps this would be a different discussion. But over 260 towns, cities, counties and states have passed resolutions opposing the Patriot Act. Arcata, California, even passed an ordinance that fines city workers $57 for cooperating with federal investigations under the aegis of the act. This strongly suggests that regular Americans do not agree that the Act will do what it supporters purportedly claim. It was passed in the heat of the moment without adequate congressional review and debate, and without regard to the harm it does to the constitutional liberties that define us as a nation. As currently constituted, it lets the government find out what a person has been reading in a public library, what they keep on their home computer or in their office financial records. The targeted person does not have to be informed of the searches before or, in some cases, afterward. Nor does the targeted person have to be a terrorism suspect.

The Patriot Act should be viewed as a metaphor for all the civil liberties violations that are currently occurring, and it is a mischaracterization to suggest that those opposing it come exclusively from the ranks of the left. David Keene, Chairman of the American Conservative Union, the nation's oldest conservative lobbying organization, opposes it. And Eagle Forum President Phyllis Schlafly and Free Congress Foundation President Paul M. Weyrich are both vocal critics.

MacDonald: Mr. Williams has given peerless examples of Patriot Act demagoguery, whose two most essential strategies are “Hide the Judge” and “Ignore Legal Precedent.” Critics denounce the provision governing the FBI’s access to business records during a terror investigation (section 215). What they don’t tell you is that the FBI can only obtain business and other records upon permission of a federal court. In fact, section 215 arguably protects rights more than the legal powers which preceded it. Had Mr. Williams been under investigation for a federal crime, his fellow citizens, sitting as a grand jury, could subpoena his credit card or library records on their own—without having to persuade a judge that those records are relevant...