FISA Bill Vote Today, With Telco Immunity

Bimo_Dude writes "Today (June 20), Steny Hoyer is bringing to the House floor the latest FISA bill (PDF), which includes retroactive immunity for the telcos. The bill also is very weak on judicial review, allowing the telcos to use a letter from the president as a 'get out of liability free' card. Here are comments from the EFF. Glenn Greenwald, writing in Salon, describes the effect of the immunity clause this way: 'So all the Attorney General has to do is recite those magic words — the President requested this eavesdropping and did it in order to save us from the Terrorists — and the minute he utters those words, the courts are required to dismiss the lawsuits against the telecoms, no matter how illegal their behavior was.'"

Comments

Treason

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

As far as I'm concerned, every single member of Congress who votes in favor of this bill is guilty of treason.

Re:Treason

[jeiler]

Which is satisfactory evidence that you do not know the definition of the word in United States law. Start with the Constitution--article III, section 3.

This is a monumentally stupid move, and (IMO, IANAL) illegal, but it is not "treason."

Re:Treason

[Anonymous Coward]

That's fine, but are you going to do something about it or just bitch online? You yanks always make a big deal about your right to keep and bear arms. Well, that right isn't worth much if once in a while you don't start actually putting bullets through the brains of those treasonous authoritarian fucks.

Re:Treason

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

There's one small detail that you are overlooking.

Companies shouldn't be breaking the law just because the government tells them to!

And if they do, they SHOULD be punished! As should the people in the government that told them to break the law.

Re:Treason

[Nursie]

I don't see a single mention of the rights of the citizens of the USA in there, just a lot of talk about business and government becoming best buddies and scratching each others' backs.

What happened to by the people, for the people?

These days it seems to be more "buy the people".

Re:Treason

[mlwmohawk]

They took an oath to uphold the constitution of the U.S.A. This is a violation of that oath. I would call this treason, yes.

Re:Treason

[Gat0r30y]

companies cannot trust the word from our government Um, companies shouldn't blindly obey any order from the government without running by legal.
If your a stock holder in one of these telecoms wouldn't you think they had some obligation to verify that what they were doing was indeed legal (it wasn't) and that they did not face exposure due to it (they should be exposed, and face serious consequences)?

Being that the cort took some time to determine that the governments actions were indeed illegal shows that it was in the gray area of right and wrong No, it was not a gray area - it was illegal, it was illegal when they did it, and it's still illegal. They knew it was illegal and they did it anyway - no legal dept. worth its salt could have possibly signed off on this sort of an action without knowing that it was never going to see the light of day. They were exposed from the inside - and they deserve to be punished for breaking the law, just because they are a corporation doesn't mean they get to skirt responsibility for their actions.

Lets fund some primary challengers

[maynard]

On both sides of the isle. Both parties have lost their way and are now off in despotic cuckoo-land. Whatever we have become, if they have their way we will certainly be no Republic any longer. The only option is to boot every damn representative who votes for this bill regardless of party. They clearly do not represent a constitution of a nation ruled by laws and not men.

I say we start with Representatives Pelosi, Hoyer, and Bond.

Re:Press the button labeled "Submit"

[InvisblePinkUnicorn]

"In the 1980s capitalism triumphed over communism. In the 1990s it triumphed over democracy."

Corrupt government officials passing legislation favoring corrupt companies is the antithesis of capitalism.

tar and feather the sob's

[Spacepup]

Since both presidential candidates are in congress, they way that they vote on this bill should be the tipping point for anyone on the fence between the two. Unless of course they both vote for this, then they should both be tarred and feathered.

Heck, we should tar and feather them anyway...every presidential candidate should learn what it feels like before they reach that office.

Re:Press the button labeled "Submit"

[Gat0r30y]

It sounds like fascism to me. Just my .02$

What will Obama do ?

[mbone]

As the new de facto leader of the Democratic Party, and as a Senator, Barack Obama could stop this with a word. What will he say ? Will he stand up for liberty ? Or betray it before he even gets elected ?

Re:Press the button labeled "Submit"

[DaedalusHKX]

You forgot the most important quote that should be on your chain:

"Any government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything you've got." - attributed to Thomas Jefferson

To translate for those hard of reason: "Any government big enough to redistribute the fruits of other people's labor to YOU by force, is big enough to take everything it wants from you, also by force. It is also big enough to run your life, and kill you or enslave you on a whim or a trumped up charge. It can also watch you and make a panopticon of your daily life. And you will like it, and clamor for it to change only enough that you won't notice the ubiquity of the abuses. Yes indeed, you will... like it." - Me

You Deserve It

[geggam]

You gave up your weapons to feel safe because you don't want the responsibility.
You gave up your rights to feel safe because you don't want the responsibility.
You feel safe because you abdicated your responsibility to ensure the govt did not run over the people.
Look ! Its American Idol. You can quit reading now.
You are safe.

nixon is not dead

[TheGratefulNet]

he's alive and well. in spirit, at least.

didn't FISA come from nixon era wiretapping?

so all the 'progress' we made since the nixon days has been overturned.

so, would that make bush the 'new nixon'?

Re:Press the button labeled "Submit"

[nuzak]

"Any government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything you've got." - attributed to Thomas Jefferson

Doesn't sound anything like him. Mark Twain perhaps.

Thing is, most of the "smaller government" people want government out of the places they want their private craven, corrupt, superstituous, hateful ideologies to rule instead. They consider it "judicial activism" when the courts say that government should stay out of proscriptive definitions of marriage, for example.

Should we really expect any less??

[crazytisay]

This type of encroachment on civil liberties was commonplace during the Red Scare and through the Vietnam era. There was backlash, some high profile scandals, and we got the FISA. 9/11 was the impetus for changing the balance of power back to the state. Since the passage of the PATRIOT Act, the government has been steadily grabbing at more (unconstitutional) powers to surveille its citizens. Hopefully there will be public backlash, but the power structure of the country is quite a bit different from previous eras. I would argue the US is more corporatist than in any previous era, and now we're fighting on two fronts. Hence the telco immunity provisions. Corporations and the state are getting a bit too cozy for my taste, and capitalism be damned, I don't want to end up in a facsist state.

New laws

[Verteiron]

I think we need a constitutional amendment. It should read:
"Any bill that comes before the Congress to be passed into law must be able to be summarized accurately and without loss of detail into 50 words or less. Once this is accomplished, the original multi-thousand page document shall be thrown out, and the 50-word summary presented for passage into law."

And perhaps another one:
"Anyone who attempts to add text to a bill that is completely at odds with or irrelevant to the bill's title shall be considered guilty of treason and put to death immediately in as brutal a way as possible."

Re:"Protection of Persons Assisiting the Governmen

[Kjella]

(B) the subject of a written request or directive [from the Executive Branch] indicating that the activity was
(ii) determined to be lawful. Now, there's nothing wrong with the Attorney General making a legal opinion - that's pretty much his job:

The original duties of this officer were "to prosecute and conduct all suits in the Supreme Court in which the United States shall be concerned, and to give his advice and opinion upon questions of law when required by the President of the United States, or when requested by the heads of any of the departments." What happens when you instruct the courts to drop any case against any action that has been "determinaed to be legal"? Folks, you have the wonderful choices of:
a) the Legislative branch instructing the Judicial branch to obey the Executive branch
b) an Executive branch that essentially makes its own law on what's legal and not
c) creating government-sponsored thugs outside the law, free from the restrictions of the government
d) all of the above

Re:IT'S NOT ILLEGAL

[hedwards]

That's what I've been trying to figure out. What the telcos were doing was illegal when they did it. Granting immunity, on the hopes that they'll know it's illegal and behave better next time is asinine.

They were well aware that they weren't being provided appropriate paperwork the last time otherwise, they'd be itching to have their day in court. Letting them off the hook for what was obviously illegal is hardly teaching them a lesson for the future.

Really, what ought to happen is the people at the top making the decision to comply with the illegal orders should go to prison.

Blackwater

[Hektor_Troy]

Granted, so far it's "only" about illegal wiretaps against U.S. citizens. But essentially this says "If the PotUS says 'do task A for me', then the company that does task A cannot and will not be held liable, even if it breaks the law."

So far that task has been (and might still be) "spy on U.S. citizens"

What's to stop the next task from being "rough up U.S. citizens who mouth off against the government"? Or "kill U.S. citizens who are a pain in the ass"?

Sure, that's a big slippery slope, but then again, I'm sure if you went back to say ... September 2000 and asked people on the street, they'd probably say that the U.S. government would NEVER allow such a thing. Of course, they'd probably say the same thing about torture (or whatever phrase you'd like to use instead), suspension of habeas corpus and a lot of other things that have happend in less than a decade. Even "small" stuff like purposely revealing the name and occupation of an active CIA agent working abroad.