Even with the Feds working around the clock monitoring communication lines, they still haven't been able to locate him. Why? According to U.S. intelligence, Osama bin Laden is evading detection because he is NOT using any form of modern hi-tech communications equipment. "He switched off a lot of communications technologies," a US intelligence spokesman said. "Now it is other people talking for him. In an innocuous conversation, you can't pick that out."

In spite of the fact, Congress is under the impression that increased and unfettered surveillance -- such as using Carnivore to monitor all Internet communications or allowing for unrestricted wiretaps -- is the only solution to stopping people like bin Laden. But if he's now using human messengers and family members to physically communicate his instructions, exactly how effective will law enforcement and its expanded surveillance powers be?

If future terrorists "display the adaptibility, patience and savage will that these hijackers did," and are able to render obsolete all our surveillance technologies and the billions spent on them, these Anti-Terrorist bills will have only succeeded in eliminating some of our most cherished and essential liberties.

We've travelled down this road before, but only to look back in amazement at how stupid we were, that we could have so easily cast aside our freedoms. Personally, I'd rather die free than live in shackles.