Slashdot Mirror
New FISA Bill Would Grant Telcoms Immunity; Vote Is Tomorrow
An anonymous reader writes "This just in: a new 'compromise' FISA Bill (PDF) was just made public, which, the Electronic Frontier Foundation reports, 'contains blanket immunity for telecoms that helped the NSA break the law and spy on millions of ordinary Americans.' The House vote is tomorrow, June 20. After all the secret rooms and everything ... if they get immunity and the public never finds out what happened, the only other logical next step is to convince everyone I know not to get an iPhone." CNN covers this get-out-of-lawsuit play as well.
He can put a stop to this.
866-675-2008 option 6, if you don't get a person then, press 0. If you get a voicemail, leave a message, then call back and dial 0 during the voicemail prompt to get a human.
Let them know:
-You are a progressive.
-Civil lawsuits are the ONLY remaining route to disclosure for the spying the bush administration perpetrated on americans.
-What the telecommunications companies did was ILLEGAL.
-He should call Hoyer and Pelosi to stop this RIGHT NOW. One phone call from the head of the democratic party should kill this nonsense.
If you have donated in the past, let them know that you will seek to have your donations returned if he does not speak out on this issue. If you haven't, let them know that you will refuse to donate or organize in the future if he refuses to take the lead on this issue.
The first step to making democrats strong on national security is standing up to republicans.
http://clerk.house.gov/member_info/mcapdir.html
Email does NOT have the same impact as a phone call.
- Slashdotters identify policitians who represent a clear danger to civil liberties.
- Slashdotters attempt to spread the word about these problems.
- The vast majority of the voting populace either doesn't hear the message, doesn't understand it, or doesn't care.
Generally, people only care about liberty when it's their own freedom being directly threatened.512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
McDermott, Jim WA 7th 225-3106
The woman who answered the phone says that he is against retroactive immunity.
That's one vote against it.
ATT is one of the companies at the center of this whole thing. The iPhone is pretty much the only compelling reason to switch to ATT, and convincing people that its actually a piece of crap and that can do better is probably easier than trying to explain to them why this legislation is bad.
As an aside, did you notice that the bill also makes it illegal to even INVESTIGATE what happened?
Haven't even bothered to notice that Chris Dodd has slipped a provision into the housing bill that requires all internet businesses and payment providers to report their transactions to the IRS.
just all financial transactions
So you guys are all worrying about Bush wiretapping a few conversations so you can sue AT&T, while the government just grabbed all the financial data.
Way to go Democrats! You guys are the best!
This is my sig.
YES:
The government has not only been intercepting international communications — they've also been intercepting communications that begin and end inside the USA. Even if you've never phoned or emailed outside the US, it's likely that communications you've made have been intercepted by the Bush administration under this program.
We know this through a careful technical analysis of the evidence provided to EFF by whistleblower and former AT&T employee Mark Klein. (You can read the analysis [PDF] and see the evidence [PDF] for yourself.) A March 2008 article in the Wall Street Journal confirmed the program's domestic focus.
Folks, call Congress, it's not too late!
=Tim=
EFF
IIRC, this is HR 6304.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
You can give money specifically to punish those who supported the bill : http://www.actblue.com/page/fisa
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
But it was Steny Hoyer (MD) who allowed the vote. Your free to give money to his opponents in the future. His opponents will be Republicans but they'll be quite moderate, so your not hurting other issues. You can then write him a nice letter explaining why you just gave $500 to his opponent but would normally never support Republicans.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Two points : Nixon was a statesman at least in international affairs. Nixon resigned.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Not sure how you can call that a "complete unknown", when its right out there in plain view for the whole world to read.
Not to mention 8 years in Illinois State Senate. Significant state, not exactly political kindergarten.
There's an autobiography, "Dreams from My Father", written before he entered political office. There's records of participation with community organizing groups, there's quite possibly a publishing record from when he worked at the Harvard Law Review or University of Chicago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama
Plenty to find out about. It's easy to see how much of this could have fallen under the radar of people who might not follow the minutia of politics closely. But to those he *stays* a complete unknown, it won't be because he's a blank slate, it'll be because people aren't doing their homework.
Tweet, tweet.
Plurality voting result in two-party governments being formed, while majority voting results in pluralist governments. This is called Duverger's law. It's very counterintuitive, but this is how elections work.
Those who would give up liberty to obtain working drivers, deserve neither liberty nor working drivers.
You may want to look into the Green Party (although it, of course, won't fit your ideology perfectly either).
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz