John Dean was on Countdown. He saw a possible pony -- that a President Obama could bring a criminal case, because this outrage only addresses the pending civil suits. I don't know if that is true, but if so, I assume that would only mean that His Nibs would pardon them on the way out the door (assuming he actually leaves).

But if they get a Presidential pardon (or if the current canker of a bill accomplishes the same thing), couldn't Henry Waxman or some other lonely truthseeker in Congress subpoena them? And wouldn't that immunity preclude pleading the 5th?

Lookin' for lemonade, folks...

Here his position rankles precisely because we know that he knows better. No doubt enormous pressures were applied, but he positioned himself as ready to resist them, and the spy regime is as odious as endless war. He is, by degrees, turning a vote for Nader into a vote of conscience -- to my chagrin but not to my surprise. He must think us idiots, but we can vote smarter than he imagines.

Glenn, your psychoanalysis is spot on -- for me and for lots of others here, it seems. In the CA primary, I voted for Obama, but with some wistfulness, as I thought Edwards' important populist message would not survive his exit. Watching Obama since then, I let myself be swept away, and to pour decades of unfulfilled hope into this vessel -- a vessel I now see is just another colander.

What hurts me the most is the obvious nature of his calculus. It wasn't the polling that led to his decision: it was the culpability of his Congressional colleagues. Insisting on denying immunity was probably within his power, but would have cost him dearly among the blood-soaked Democratic leadership. He knew he could buy their allegiance without losing too many from the left flank.

He is yet another pragmatist, but worst of all, perhaps is that he is a cunning one. Occasional Observer may vote for Nader in protest; I probably will not. S/he may accept a McCain win to preserve purity; I cannot. Because, dammit, I am a pragmatist, too, and Obama's cold calculus assumes -- correctly, alas -- my own.

Standing.

It won't matter how egregious the 4th Amendment violation is. Even if there is a Constitutional infirmity on ex post facto or other grounds, we'll never get to the merits.

We'll be stopped at the door by the standard approach to barring plaintiffs from bringing such challenges.

We don't have standing to challenge them because the injury is not specific to us. The only people with standing are those who have been spied upon, and we'll never know who they are because of this bill.

How elegant.

No question that the problem you identify is central to the problem. But what is the root cause?

The Bill of Rights and the rule of law seem to have drifted outside the Overton window. That probably isn't the root cause either, but it seems to me you can't get this kind of rollover from the Dems and TNR unless something significant goes wrong with the moral compasses of an awful lot of people.

I have seen an awful lot of rationalization among Obama supporters -- talk about how compromise is the art of politics and such. I have lots of policy preferences I am willing to horse trade with. But I have, and thought others had, some bedrock principles that I do not want my representatives trading away. For me, the 4th Amendment is one of them. But that has obviously become a minority view. When, how, and why did that happen? I want to understand what the hell is going on here, and I think I need to know the answer to that question to understand the fix we're in.

To "War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength" we must add, "Preemptive Capitulation is Victory."

Just saw Saxby Chambliss bemoan the troubles of the poor, defenseless telecoms. He pointed out that the lawsuits against the telcos are really aimed at the government. (Which is at least in part true.) But he said that this immunity will not prevent plaintiffs from going after the government directly, which AFAIK is nonsense -- no one will have standing to bring such an action, which is why we have had this pitched battle over the telco cases.

But what if the bill were amended to specifically grant standing to those suing the government for warrantless wiretaps in the public interest? I don't know if that is possible, but maybe we can take the "poor, poor, pitiful telco" argument away from them. And since Saxby and his friends really, really want to get at the truth, the bill could also compel the telcos to testify in those cases. (Not sure that is necessary, but it couldn't hurt.)