This is the email I received in reply from my Senator. The language should look familiar.

Dear (XXX):

Thank you for contacting me with regard to the issue of retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies in S.2248, the FISA Amendments Act of 2007. I appreciate hearing from you.

As you know, S.2248 falls under the jurisdiction of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, as well as the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. The Senate Intelligence Committee reported the bill with a retroactive immunity provision included, but the Senate Judiciary Committee’s version of S.2248 did not include this provision. These differences will likely be reconciled once S.2248 comes to the full Senate for consideration.

I am committed to crafting a FISA bill in the Senate that gives intelligence officials the tools they need to vigorously combat the threat of terrorism while operating within the rule of law.

Again, thank you for taking the time to share your views. Please rest assured I will keep them in mind should the Senate proceed to consideration of S.2248.

Sincerely,

Ken Salazar

United States Senator

[emphasis mine]

From ThinkProgress:

Hersh: Bush Told Olmert Of NIE Two Days Before President Was Allegedly First Briefed On It

Yesterday, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley told reporters that President Bush was first briefed on the National Intelligence Estimate’s conclusions on Wednesday, Nov. 28.

But today in an interview with CNN, Seymour Hersh, The New Yorker’s Pulitzer-Prize winning investigative journalist, revealed that Bush actually knew about the NIE at least two days earlier and had a “private discussion” about it with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert before the Middle East peace summit in Annapolis, MD, last week...

I'm kind of inclined to trust Seymour Hersh, myself.

http://tinyurl.com/2p9xc5

I respect your outrage. Further, I think you're entitled to be outraged. However, I sincerely hope you have not yet mailed that letter to Priscilla Painton. IANAL, but your choice of expression could be construed as threatening, may make you subject to libel laws, and be especially problematic if you're using the US mail system. I would counsel against that form of protest in a general sense, and I would recommend that you not follow through with your fund raising campaign.

As they say, advice is worth what you pay for it, and you've paid nothing for this.

ARRRGH! Thanks, Anonymust, I think. These are 'mine;' either products I use/consume or industries I am/have been affiliated with. Not sure what to think about the US Mint. Not sure I have any leverage with that one.

California Almonds, a (1/3-page) column, and another full page, touting the significant health benefits of eating almonds

RosettaStone: The fastest way to learn a language. Guaranteed.

Got Milk? "Knockout" I'm guessing this one is of Ali's daughter, but she looks different dressed like that.

The United States Mint: www.usmint.gov or 1-800-usa-mint

Something I found interesting in that list (G_d, drawing it up would have made me crazy. You're tougher than me.) were the ~11 "pharma" adverts. Not a surprise, given all, but interesting. Thanks for doing the work.

One other stray thought as I look over that list one last time is how well it tends to define a demographic. If I think of the folks to whom those ads are targeted, it tends to suggest a middle class, middle-aged/older, Boomer group. Makes me wonder how one might put out a counter-argument targeted to the same demographic. Something to sleep on. Again, thanks for taking the time.

I assume Glenn will post that e-mail at some point. For an early preview, I found what appears to be the e-mail Glenn referenced posted at Democratic Underground: http://tinyurl.com/3btap7

Setting the Record Straight on FISA - From John Conyers email

From an email John Conyers has sent out --

In recent weeks, there has been lot of conflicting information floating around about efforts by House Democrats to protect the country by adopting rules for intelligence gathering that are both flexible and constitutional. This week, President Bush suggested that my legislative alternative to this summer's hastily-enacted Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) reform, the "Protect America Act," would take away important tools from our intelligence community. He characterized as "obstruction" the skepticism that many of us have about granting amnesty to telecommunications carriers who may have cooperated in warrantless surveillance. I was disappointed that the President did not propose any concrete steps to improve our capabilities or protect our freedoms -- he just repeated his demand for immunity....

The bonus: since the information is factually correct, Controversy is very likely to withstand the test of the wiki overseers. Well done.

I hadn't considered that possibility. I did note that minutes before appearing on Glenn's threads, puunjab's same comment appeared in a thread at FireDogLake. At FDL, as far as I could tell, no one responded to punnjab. The comment just hung. I wondered at the time what FDL commenters knew that we didn't. In retrospect, I tend to surmise that punnjab is no more a regular commenter at FDL than s/he is here.