In the most spectacularly unnoticed shifts of the United States towards becoming a police state, the House voted today not only to renew the Patriot Act provisions for another four years, but to make most of them permanent, with a few to be checked again in ten years.

Billmon has a summary of exactly what this allows the government to do, for those that haven't been paying attention.

It's time to write to your senators (at least those of you not living in a place where even the Democratic senators are hopeless, such as I am), since that's the only place where the damage can even be mitigated at this point. That and make sure your passport is up to date, and you've got a clean exit plan from the country.