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Lawmakers Delay Telco Immunity Vote

Posted by kdawson on from the done-wrong-now-what dept.

eweekhickins writes "The US Senate Judiciary Committee delayed a scheduled vote on whether telecommunications carriers should be granted immunity for cooperating with the White House's domestic spying program of telephone wiretapping and e-mail surveillance. The panel hopes to vote on the provision as soon as next week. Senator Pat Leahy said that immunity would make it impossible for Americans to seek redress for 'illegal' violations of their privacy." The article points out the confused state of the immunity measure: the House is considering a version of FISA renewal that has no immunity; in the Senate, two committees are working on different versions, one with immunity, one without.

3 of 102 comments (clear)

  1. Other side by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I would like to take side of telcoms. They worked with government agencies. Government agencies said "Help us spying or you will be against law". And now government says "You were helping us spying, you were against law". So is it fault of telcoms or government?

  2. Re:This is complete horseshit by AlamedaStone · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is the new Limbaugh meme, right? Progressives are really the old school Commie sympathizers, who have weaseled their way into key government positions to undermine REAL Amurricuns? Is it Zionism, or Islamofascists? Or maybe the Mexicans... it's so hard to keep track of all the paranoid, xenophobic rhetoric!

    Want me to top off that kool-aid for you?

    --
    "All these years believing you're the signified monkey, only to find out you're just a big hunk of nobody cares."
  3. Court vs government by BlueParrot · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The government makes the laws, the police investigate/arrest people suspected of breaking it, and the courts decide if someone should be punished. So why the fuck is the government about to decide if the telcos should be punished or not? Even if they made a law to give them imunity, surely that should apply only to future wrongdoings... Retroactively changing the law is only acceptable under very exceptional circumstances. Of course, these days retroactively raising the income tax could probably be justified as "national security", so it is not as if it is surprising...