Is it unconstitutional for a law to change the law retroactively, and would telecom amnesty/immunity fall under this?

Article 1, Section 9 of the Constitution says:

"No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed. "

I am upset this is coming now, in another week I'll have time and it will be too late.

In addition to asking your senator to support Chris Dodd's filibuster, consider asking your senator to go all the way and support either 1) allowing the PAA to expire until the Congress can muster the time, energy, and interest to do this thing right, or, 2) Backing a call to start from the SJC version of the bill.

I've been like a broken record on some of this, and I'm glad the twin issues of databasing/datamining and link analysis have been pointed to by Glenn (thanks too to pow wow -- wow that's a lot of o's in one phrase), but the minimization, targeting, and continuation procedures need your attention. This piece, at least, is done right in the SJC version. Rollbacks are also worthy -- that is, that all 'intelligent' software should be rolled back to its prior state if the intelligence gathered is deemed to be illegally acquired. They are also in the SJC version.

The ACLU favors expiry followed by a new, more careful, bill. I would favor going with the SJC version and working on ACLU concerns -- expiry doesn't deal with rollbacks.

small glossary:

minimization: Procedures that must be filed for a surveillance procedure to specify how the surveillers will minimize the amount of data acquired that was not supposed to be part of the surveillance -- e.g. information about people with whom the target has contacts, but aren't themselves under surveillance. It's supposed to be destroyed, and a court is supposed to approve the method.

targeting: Procedures that must be filed, like the minimization procedures, only these state how the surveillers will properly target the person under surveillance, and avoid targeting others in the process. If minimization is about how to destroy the information you accidentally picked up, targeting is about how to avoid picking it up.

continuation: This is a new clause, whose origin dates to the original 66 page overhaul the President proposed in April. The idea here is that the AG or DNI approves an interim surveillance project, and when they go to court, the court says no. At that point the AG/DNI can ask for 30 days to fix it. If that doesn't work, they can appeal the decision. What continuation does is allow them to continue the court disapproved of surveillance during this whole process. Think of it as proactive immunity for telecoms and spooks. If you go to the White House web site that discusses the SJC version versus what the White House wants, this is the most important part of the bill! Ask yourself why.

rollback: In any artificial intelligence program that learns or adapts, when new information is acquired, parameters are updated. That is the learning process. Those parameters help the next action of the program. In the case where the program is trying to find terrorists, think of the parameters as numerical amalgamations of keywords, links, suspicions, and anything else that would constitute new knowledge about the terrorists we don't know about yet. In a very real sense, it is an abstract, more sophisticated, less individualized version of a police suspicious persons list. Among other things, it enables the computer or the analyst to have hunches about who to suspect. The common feature of such lists is that they never forget. Mandating rollback would force the government to return to the state of not knowing a piece of information if the information was illegally or improperly acquired. Anything else means that it is used to build lists.

Good luck with the discussions, I have to be on the sidelines. Just remember you aren't just protecting Americans from the NSA stepping on the 4th amendment and the telecoms stepping on the rule of law. You're protecting them from corporate intrusion as well. All of these datamining products eventually make it into the hands of marketing departments, where they're used to control your desire for their 'stuff'.

Senator Edwards,

As a contributor to and supporter of your presidential campaign, I fervently hope you will call attention to the FISA debate and the issue of “retroactive immunity” for lawbreaking telecoms.

Retroactive Immunity. It pains me to type it. What a PR coup! Doesn’t it just sound so much better than “breaking the law then getting away with it because you are rich and connected?”

This is a winning opportunity for you; a chance to take the moral high-ground and embarrass your rivals who benefit from telecom contributions and support.

I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that in addition this is a strong issue with the netroots. You will be sure to gain internet exposure. The corporate media can hardly cover you any less so there’s little to lose.

I am confident you will emerge as a leader against special treatment for telecoms.

Best wishes and regards,

Once again I implore you to participate on the Senate floor if Chris Dodd is forced to filibuster the telecom immunity provision of the FISA bill. All three Democratic candidates have issued statements in support of this issue, but no one including yourself has shown a willingness to back that support with concrete action.

The poll results that the ACLU recently published make clear that this is a winning issue with the public at large.

How much more of a winning issue would it be among potential primary voters?

This issue has consumed my entire morning. Started with a worthless phone call to Reid's Washington DC office, followed by writing an e-mail to Reid, followed by submitting a couple of posts to Glenn's blog, followed by reading Glenn's latest post, followed by this post. Obviously, Reid has already decided to re-introduce the IC bill, rather than the JC bill. GAGG!!!!

RE: FISA Bill -- No Telcom Immunity

Dear Senator,

I am offended by Majority Leader Reid's admonition to the Senate that the FISA bill must get done this week in order not to inconvenience the schedules of elected officials. I quote: "We have to finish FISA this week. Everyone should be aware of that point. We have to finish it this week. I know there are important trips people want to take. We have the very important economic conference in Davos that Democrats and Republicans alike would like to go to.."

This bill does NOT need to get fnnished this week. No bill at all is better than this FISA bill. I urge you to support NO BILL that contains retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies. This is a bad bill that few Americans support. Please do not allow Majority Leader Reid to ram the FISA bill down the throats of the American People. Please support Senators Dodd and Feingold in their pledge to filibuster any FISA bill that does so.

Thank you.

Binx