Letters to the Editor

• The FISA UC Agreement Is Now A Done Deal

  [Read the article: Enemies everywhere]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  At about 8:10 p.m. ET, this evening, Harry Reid came to the Senate floor and sped through the complicated Unanimous Consent agreement for taking up amendments to the Senate Intelligence Committee's FISA bill, starting Monday. This would be a UCAgreement that Chris Dodd (and Feingold) finally agreed to, and I hope Dodd or Feingold lets us know where things stand.

  It was read too fast, and the feed was too intermittent for me to catch most of it, but cboldt recorded it, and will be spelling it out soon I believe, probably in this thread at emptywheel's:

  http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2008/01/31/dicks-evolving-demands-for-immunity/

  The first vote (or pre-vote debate), if I heard right, will commence on a Sheldon Whitehouse amendment at 2 p.m., Monday. The Senate will not be in session on Friday (tomorrow).

  The UCAgreement seems to be splitting the votes into those amendments (8, I believe) which will be allowed to pass by simple majority - but with motions to table "in order" on them - and others which will require 60 votes to pass (and withdrawal if they fail to reach that). Included in the simple majority eight, I believe I heard listed #3907 (with two hours of debate), #3927 (ditto), and #3923 (45 minutes of debate).

  The Senate is now adjourned for the week.

  Permalink Thursday, January 31, 2008 05:51 PM