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Dodd's Filibuster Threat Stalls Wiretap Bill
otakuj462 sends in an important followup to this morning's story on telecom immunity legislation. "Senator Chris Dodd won a temporary victory today after his threats of a filibuster forced Democratic leadership to push back consideration of a measure that would grant immunity to telecom companies that were complicit in warrantless surveillance... [T]he threat of Dodd's filibuster... persuaded Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV, to table the act until January. A compromise on the immunity will ostensibly be worked out in the interim period."
Don't you wish the rest of congress could grow a spine?
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
They used filters and monitors and logging to spy on all traffic passing through key peering nodes on the say-so of the white house and the intelligence agencies even though such spying was illegal at the time it happened. I say we should hang AT&T, Verizon and the others out to dry for what they did. If it means they make less profit this year, tough, its their own fault for following the directions of G.W.Bush and his cronies instead of following the law (and demanding warrants for the spying)
Don't look at this as a permanent victory either guys- the pressure needs to be kept up on all of the members of the Senate, especially those that may be on the fence (the other spineless democrats). Calls and emails made a difference today- Orrin Hatch was livid about "the blogs" spreading misinformation, and Reid obviously heard by the end of the day that his constituents were not happy that he was going to try and ram this bill through. When this comes back up in January, be heard. And better yet, contact your senator between now and then and let them know you won't accept retroactive immunity.
Democrats want immunity for big business. Republicans want big government.
Are the parties flip-flopping again or are they finally coming into parity with the fact that they're just one big party with two masks so the people get a sense they they're getting a change every 4 or 8 years?
The threat of a filibuster shouldn't have even been necessary if the government was really for the people by the people.
...and that's the way the cookie crumbles.
It was quite refreshing to listen to Dodd describe in fair detail the crap that's been going on:
The installation of systems poorly suited to specific taps but ideally suited to dragnet surveillance. In major fiber exchanges that aren't where the main foreign fiber trunks or satellite dishes are (i.e. the San Fransisco case that started it). And now we learn that Qwest balked because they wanted to put a dragnet on a switch center that handled almost entirely local traffic.
Then Orrin "destroy their computers" Hatch started speaking. About how the American government didn't do {the bombings in Beruit, the Bali nightclub bombing, the bombings in Kenya, the London tube bombings, the Madrid train bombings, and (of course) 9/11}, the Turrists did. And I'm sitting here trying hard not to scream "And how would dragnet surveillance of domestic calls have stopped a single damn one of those things!?!?"
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
In the Constitution, See Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3:
Which means no retroactive anything is legal. I'm amazed that the media continues to overlook this critical bit.
On second thought, no I'm not. There can be no compromise on this. The telcos colluded with Bushco to perform illegal acts, and granting them immunity after the fact is not allowed.
Yes, and a pine is not a plant - it's a tree.
Representative Republic is _a_ _form_ _of_ _democracy_.
Let's see...
He seems to like the Thought Crime concept. Rather than merely punishing people for bad actions, he supports the idea that we should try to guess if a criminal might hate his victim. Extra years in prison for Thought Crime makes sense to him.
He's OK with the government taking people's legally owned firearms during an emergency or major disaster. (as in Katrina... where the cops were followed by thugs preying on the now-unarmed residents) Got a disaster? Time to steal from the people!
He somehow thinks that firearm suppliers should be held liable for the actions of firearm users. If this seems sane to you, consider applying it to computers or vehicles. (on the plus side, that kind of liability would put Microsoft out of business and solve all our traffic problems)
He likes the PATRIOT act. Oh dear...
He's a CAN SPAM kind of guy.
He's OK with shovelling money to sugarcane growers.
The problem is that democracy sucks. Democracy leads to countless evils. Slavery in the US was democracy in action, as were Jim Crow Laws. The South splitting from the US was democracy in action. Hitler rising to power was democracy in action. There is nothing "good" about democracy other than it leaves a way to kick someone who is utterly incompetent out of power. Democracy is less likely to cause brutal oppression than a dictatorship due to the electorate having the ability to remove the government, but it is by no means a guarantee.
The US constitution, something that is generally revered as being as a model constitution is an example of an UNDEMOCRATIC document. The constitution sets in place limits that a democratically elected government must follow, irregardless of what the will of the people is. It sets in place a method of changing the constitution that demands far more than a "democratic" majority vote. The Supreme Court which upholds the constitution is an example of an undemocratic institution. In fact, I would say the things I like best about the American part are its undemocratic parts, not the democratically elected pieces of it.
So, is a filibuster an example of an anti-democratic purpose? Hell yes, and I love it! The best thing about the American system is the fact that a simple majority can't impose its will upon the minority. In order to get even the simplest of things done, you need a majority of 60%. To get truly earth shattering done (like changing the constitution), you need a super majority well over 2/3's. This is a good thing. This is one of the reasons why despite Europe being far more liberal than the US, the US still has much strong free speech laws. It isn't because Americans are hippies, it is because the non-democratic aspects of the American government make it virtually impossible to pass anti-free speech legislation, and even when it is passed, it promptly gets struck down.
I say hurray for the non-democratic institutions. I think we need MORE of them. This world needs more liberal (liberal as in liberty, not leftist) institutions and less democracy.
Its a noun, which means: We are a democratic republic. We *are* a democracy, even though we use representation. We are a republic, even though the supreme power is vested in the people.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23