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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."
If you like Dodd's move, be sure to contact his office and express your support. Let him know he is doing the right thing.
Just because you can, does not mean you should.
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)
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.
No - ex post facto applies to criminal law, not civil law. Here are the four types of laws considered "ex post facto" in the U.S., established in Calder v. Bull:
"1st. Every law that makes an action , done before the passing of the law, and which was innocent when done, criminal; and punishes such action.
2nd. Every law that aggravates a crime, or makes it greater than it was, when committed.
3rd. Every law that changes the punishment, and inflicts a greater punishment, than the law annexed to the crime, when committed.
4th. Every law that alters the legal rules of evidence, and receives less, or different, testimony, than the law required at the time of the commission of the offence, in order to convict the offender."
Ex post facto laws are only those which punish people who were formerly innocent - not the other way around.
Disclaimer: IANAL
The Dodd Gambit is a success.
And as he reluctantly tabled the bill. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was heard muttering "Dodd Gambit" under his breath.
For the Democrats (e.g. Dianne Feinstein who can be reached at 202-224-3841), one motive is the obvious one: telecoms contribute to campaigns.
Much more is at stake for the Republicans, since the president broke at least several federal statutes relating to wiretapping. While this is all something that "everybody knows", that has no legal significance and no one bears any meaningful responsibility to do anything about it. But if the EFF lawsuit (among others) doesn't have its legal basis legislated right out from under it, then it will be revealed in a court of law that the president committed federal crimes. The telecom immunity legislation was designed by the executive branch to extend immunity not just to telecoms who broke these laws, but to anyone in the government who asked them to do it (PDF): Obviously the EFF lawsuit presents a pickle for the Republicans if it is legally shown that Bush was complicit in lawbreaking, and they don't want the lawsuit to proceed further. But this is a problem for the Democrats too. Once it becomes legally evident that Bush broke the law, it becomes incumbent upon them to do something about it, or they are breaking the law with their inaction. Everyone knows Bush is a criminal, but nobody wants to be responsible for knowing. Politics as currently practiced is a fragile thing, home to a glassy web of unspoken agreements and hard-won compromises. A development like this would come stampeding in on all that like a bull in a china shop. This telecom immunity law will make a lot of headaches go away for a lot of people- the telecoms themselves are actually minor players here.
We have had motivation as an essential factor in a crime for as long as law exists. It is called mens rea. If you run someone over because it's dark and you didn't see them, your punishment will not be the same as it would be if you run them over because you wanted to kill them.
Mens rea is a "guilty mind". Yes, this means every crime committed consists both of a thought crime and a criminal act. The concept of thought crime in this context makes very good sense. The context in which it is not tolerable is when thought crime is punishable on its own, without a criminal act.