Court bars government’s probes of scientists - who have no access to classified info
Conform or die!
A federal appeals court has barred the Bush administration from looking into
the personal lives of NASA scientists and engineers who have no access to
classified information, saying the probes are intrusive and unrelated to
national security.
The planned inquiry into the employees’ backgrounds, finances, alcohol and drug use, mental state and unspecified additional issues amounted to a “broad inquisition” with “absolutely no safeguards” that would limit disclosures to topics that are important to the government, said the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.
The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by 28 scientists and engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, who were about to be fired in October for refusing to submit to the background checks when another panel of the court issued an emergency order.
The employees “face a stark choice - either violation of their constitutional rights or loss of their jobs,” Judge Kim Wardlaw said in Friday’s 3-0 ruling…
To keep their jobs, employees at the agencies are required to authorize the government to seek information about them from any source, including former employers, landlords, schools and acquaintances. The sources can be asked if they have any negative information about an employee’s work, truthfulness, finances, alcohol or drug use, emotional stability, overall behavior or “other matters,” the court said.
You have to be really careful about those “other matters”.
The planned inquiry into the employees’ backgrounds, finances, alcohol and drug use, mental state and unspecified additional issues amounted to a “broad inquisition” with “absolutely no safeguards” that would limit disclosures to topics that are important to the government, said the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.
The ruling came in a lawsuit filed by 28 scientists and engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, who were about to be fired in October for refusing to submit to the background checks when another panel of the court issued an emergency order.
The employees “face a stark choice - either violation of their constitutional rights or loss of their jobs,” Judge Kim Wardlaw said in Friday’s 3-0 ruling…
To keep their jobs, employees at the agencies are required to authorize the government to seek information about them from any source, including former employers, landlords, schools and acquaintances. The sources can be asked if they have any negative information about an employee’s work, truthfulness, finances, alcohol or drug use, emotional stability, overall behavior or “other matters,” the court said.
You have to be really careful about those “other matters”.
Posted: Sat - January 12, 2008 at 01:56 PM