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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
What about waiting until next February to initiate a new suit with the new Attorney General not providing the required certification?
That comment about if they pass this, to name ONE thing the democratic majority has accomplished since taking control of the House & Senate. This will take the one thing they did accomplish, stopping this immunity foolishness, and change it to ZERO accomplishments.
And, where the hell is Obama? Where's Mr. Change? Will he vote "present" on this, too? Sorry, but I'm so angry with this, and his lack of leadership, I can hardly stand it. I have this sickening feeling that an Obama presidency will be full of such moments.
I'll still, reluctantly, vote for him this Autumn. He was not my first choice, but, oh well, oh hell.
--Ron
designed to prevent or detect a terrorist attack, or activities in preparation of a terrorist attack, against the United States"
Where and by what process does it get determined if the telco action was designed to prevent or detect a terrorist attack?
Who makes that determination. Or does it merely have to state that in the letter?
Any chance these ads can get out today?
It's great to raise all this money, but these counter-attacks need to begin today somehow, if the vote is tomorrow.
what can be done today?
faxes, phone calls and emails, I assume?
I seem to recall Sen. Dodd saying he would do everything possible to keep telco immunity from passing. So where is he? Why isn't he filibustering? I donated money to his presidential campaign because he stood up last December and did just that, filibustered the bill and kept it from passing. I remember Glenn writing a column criticizing some beltway DC journalist, because she dismissed Dodd's actions as purely political. Well it seems she was right because I don't see Dodd doing jack shit on this. I always knew the dems would cave on this issue. They just postponed doing it til our attention was diverted else where. Tomorrow when it passes, McCain or Obama will do or say something, and that's all the news networks will report on. The sell out of our rights and constitution won't even get reported.
Glenn, perhaps I'm reading this wrong, but just based on the section of the bill that you quoted, it looks like there might be something else going on that in some ways might make this a bit more of a compromise.
If (and I really mean IF) that is what is going on, the compromise might be something like this: OK, you can have your stupid amnesty for any actions taken within these specified dates, but in exchange, there is no amnesty for anything that happens after January 17th 2007.
If that is the case, then perhaps that's the compromise right there.
I still agree with you 100% that this is unnecessary and craven, and a huge cave-in to Bush and the tele-comms, but perhaps (and I really mean perhaps) it's not quite as bad as it seems right now.
Do you know what aspect of the law applies to actions taken after January 17th 2007? Thanks,
-- Joel
Glen,
Two things. One, It appears the lawsuits could be maintained for any warrantless spying done before 9-11-01. From what I have read there appears to be some evidence to support the contention that the Bush administration started their warrantless spying program before 9-11-01. The second thing that seems strange is just because the Attorney General says the program was legal does not make it so. Does he just have to say the words or does he have to prove to the court in some way how and why they determined it was legal?
if the Attorney General certifies to the district court of
I apparently skipped right over the bolded section......
Can we kill this in the Senate? Can we kill this in the House?
I have been calling all of my representatives with two anti-FISA Amendment pitches. The first is "stand up for the Constitution". The second is "Stand up for yourself: we've raised $200,000 already, and the Ron Paul money-bomb people are involved. We will have MILLIONS to go after anyone who supports this, and if you vote for it, we're gonna getcha." I intend to keep calling my reps, to let them know that the hammer is coming down if they vote for this garbage.
It is an indicator of Stainy's discomfort that the Majority Leader's site has scrubbed their contact phone number: where it used to say "contact the Leader" now you can only email. The number by the way is 202-225-3130.
Hi Glenn,
I browsed the bill myself this morning and it also seems like the act provides that the Federal judge must keep the reasoning for case dismissal secret too. We won't even get to know that the lawsuit was dismissed because the AG provided a get-out-of-jail-free card to the telco.
One of the small hopes I had for this cave in was that at least keeping the lawsuits to the regular public courts would allow that much revelation. Instead I believe we will just see the lawsuits dismissed with little to no explanation.
-Daniel De Groot
Where and by what process does it get determined if the telco action was designed to prevent or detect a terrorist attack?Who makes that determination. Or does it merely have to state that in the letter?
The AG only needs to state that the purpose was to stop the Terrorists. There is no inquiry to see if that is true. All the requirements are prefaced by "the AG certifies that . . . ."
"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
-Abraham Lincoln
The telcos already have prospective immunity. They also have retroactive immunity for those actions taken in a reasonable good faith belief that the actions legal. That's why this is so alarming -- we are talking about, by definition, actions the telcos knew were illegal when they took them.
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