Catch-22 Explained, Courtesy of Your Friendly Neighborhood Patriot Act

Are you a student having trouble understanding what the concept called "Catch-22" means? It's at the core of the novel '>Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, which is today considered a classic and is widely assigned, in areas where it is not yet banned.

Your ever-helpful government is here with a demonstration of Catch-22 in action, and it's no farther away than your local library, in areas that still have them!

The Patriot Act contains a provision, called Section 215, that permits Your Government to gather information on your reading from libraries. For example, Your Government could find out if you happen to have withdrawn a copy of Catch-22.

Critics of Your Government in Action say this is unwarranted intrusion that violates the First Amendment to the Constitution, and smacks of the Orwellian mind control society of '>Nineteen-Eighty Four.

Your Government says this is nonsense, that in fact in has never used Section 215 to gather information from libraries, for example, on people who read Nineteen Eighty-Four or the '>U.S. Constitution. Though libraries report more than 200 requests for such information from the U.S. government, they cannot say if these requests were made with the authority of Section 215.

Section 215 prohibits libraries from telling anyone that such a request under 215 has been made. Therefore, there is no information to challenge Your Government's assertion that it has never used Section 215. Nor can there ever be.

Catch-22.

This educational experience has been brought to you by Your Government in Action.

If you are reading this in a library, you may feel secure knowing that if Your Government investigates people who read this column, you will never know about it. Of course, if you wind up in a cell at Guantanamo, you might begin to wonder.

Fishing in the Card Catalogs - New York Times