I believe the ACLU is challenging the new FISA law as unconstitutional because of it granting retroactive immunity to the telecoms and Bush officials, who willfully broke the law. I wish I could remember the name of this case and where it stands in the courts. Also there is a FISA case in the 9th Circuit: Al Haramain v NSA where the plaintiff is seeking damages for the illegal spying and this case appears to be headed toward a default judgment in favor of the plaintiffs.

I also recall a few lesser reported FISA issue cases still in the courts too even though many others were dismissed.

So this issue is a long way from being over with or litigated to the fullest.

I went through my files and found this link to a good compilation of FISA cases still ongoing and the issues surrounding them.

http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/06/04/vaughn-walkers-chess-game-the-cases/

I noticed that Ford's approval rating dropped from 71% before the pardon to 49% in less than a month. At least in 1974, the average citizen expected criminals, no matter their position, to face the consequences of their crimes.

I completely agree. In 1974, we didn't have the deadly toxic miasma of extreme, obtuse partisanship we have nowadays. I have several ideas about how we came to this point but I do not want to bore the forum participants to respiratory arrest.

One thing is sure; there is now an almost irresistible combination of forces that preclude the very exercise of democracy in this country.

The one that truly condition every other is the extreme moral depravity ( Hey Alicia! I'm looking at you.) of the MSM, as brilliant and relentlessly exposed by our own Glenzilla, Media Matters, NPR Check and numerous others. With it came the "Daily Me" phenomenon: Reichwing radio talk show hosts, Fix News, all outlets that enable a certain kind of persons to nurture their basic prejudices without ever being challenged. Let's not forget the numerous think tanks generously funded by the Big Money which talking points are dutifully stenographed by a cohort of cowards and slothful "journalists" for whom the idea of hard work is to schmooze with Officialdom and Administration Senior Officials, which acronym (ASO'ls) is often times well deserved.

It'll take brave men and women to explode the bunker of lies and deception we have now. But hey! There are some positive news out there. Newsweek report that AG Holder is getting fed up of not asserting his independence about Bush and the torture affair.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/206300

Nixon was never convicted or tried for any crimes, and Ford pardoned Nixon after he resigned under the premise that the country had go through the Watergate hearings and they did not want to endure anymore. The public was delighted to have tricky Dick gone. Nixon resigned because republicans in Congress went to the White house and encouraged him to resign saying they would have to vote to impeach him if he did not. In fact Nixon was never impeached because he agreed to resign.

This was meant to be a report, not an investigation. The main fact this report pointed out is that the whole sale wire tapping of American citizen's international communications did not result in any information that wa sueful stopping any future attacks or lead to any information into 9/11. The new 2008 FISA law requires a warrant first, and more oversight. However wouldn't the report be useful in getting Congress the review the wiretap law.

I find it hard to imagine that they don't believe, privately, that these were all not merely crimes, but very serious crimes that threatened our form of government (as it were), that in a perfect world should and would be investigated, prosecuted and punished, but which in the world that they live and operate in, cannot be investigated, as they see it, let alone prosecuted and punished, because to do so would not only derail their agenda, but imperil them politically.

I'm not entirely ruling out the possibility that they don't view these as crimes, or that they do, but don't really care one way or another about them. But I think that the most likely scenario is that they believe that they can't persue these crimes, especially not now, because it would cause the sort of political blowback that they neither want nor believe that they can afford, right now.

If so, then, the real question, to me at least, is whether they have decided to try to forever put these crimes behind them and never investigate or prosecute them properly, or they have decided to put these crimes aside for now, perhaps allowing quiet background investigations to go on but nothing that directly touches on the principals for now, so as to deny the other side the ability to try to derail their domestic agenda with cries of "partisan witch hunt!", as they persue this agenda, and only after having achieved the bulk of it, or perhaps increased their majorities in '10, reopen these cases for more serious investigation.

My guess is that they're telling themselves that it's the latter, i.e. that they're only putting investigations aside for now, until the proper time, to assuage their consciences, but that in reality they dearly hope that it's the former, and that they never have to actually investigate these crimes properly, because, realistically, their agenda will never be fully achieved, and there will always be new goals that any such investigations could derail, in their minds. So even if they're telling themselves that this freeze on investigations is temporary, in reality, they will likely always find a way to justify delaying them yet further, until, they hope, enough time has passed that no one remembers or cares anymore (like that intel report that's been delayed multiple times, and likely will never be released).

Personally, I think that we're dealing with morally broken people, people who have either been so currupted by years of political compromise, deal-making and prostitution, that they're no longer capable of taking morally courageous positions on anything major, even if they might once have been, early in their careers, or who were never very morally activated in the first place, born cynics who view politics as being about winning and losing, not doing good.

Not that there aren't Dems (and, perhaps, a tiny handful of Repubs who are afraid to speak out), who are still very much morally driven and very much want and are trying to do the right thing here. Nor, also, that there aren't some Dems (and the overwhelming majority of Repubs), who genuinely don't give a damn about these crimes, or even view them as crimes. But I'm guessing that the majority of Dems, and perhaps a few Repubs, either don't care enough about these crimes to persue them, and/or are afraid of what persuing them would do to their agenda, and are willing, reluctantly or not, to put this aside, whether for now or for good.

In terms of motivation, I don't believe that they're all the same. But in terms of action, they are, effectively, all the same, to the extent that they are preventing these crimes from being actively investigated, both now, and ever. And they will hopefully be judged for such.

Realistically, though, I think that the only chance we'll have for serious investigations is after the major policy initiatives now being persued are either accomplished, or defeated. Meaning, health care reform, climate change and energy reform, and financial regulation, restructuring and rebuilding--and when the economy's begun to genuinely recover. Until then, I just don't see it happening. Not with these Dems. Not with Obama at the helm. But we should absolutely keep up the pressure. If we don't, then any chance that they might someday be investigated will disappear. Only be keeping their feet to the fire and if necessary embarrassing them in public will there ever be real investigations, however slim a chance there is that there ever might be.