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Retroactive Telco Immunity Opponents Buying TV Ad
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Whether they're mad at the Republicans for creating the mess, the Democrats for caving in, or both, many are still pissed off over the grant of retroactive immunity for spying on American citizens for no reason. And now some of them are trying to do something about it — they're buying an advertisement on cable TV. While it's not entirely clear what good, if any, this will do given that it's too late, at least it's cheap to participate — they're looking for $6 donations. The ideas is that, if more grass-roots groups do this kind of thing, their 'representatives' won't be able to afford to blow them off as easily."
and then throw them out again.
Never vote for an incumbant again, at least
for another 3 election cycles.
I don't care, throw them out. You think you
have a 'good guy' in congress? You're wrong.
Throw them out.
All of them. /that/ is the fix for so called special interest lobbies. Take away their power.
That is the only fix.
Better that the government never get anything
else done.
I AM against telco immunity. I'm against domestic wiretapping. I'm against an administration that blatantly disregards the Constitution and regards everything they do as legal, simply because they are doing it. However, hard experience has taught me that contributing to ANY cause gets me on mailing lists for "similar" causes - whether I want to be or not.
I no longer give to charity for an extension of those same reasons. Charities are now run like businesses, with salaried fund raisers, and wage slaver collectors on the streets. They pay to make money, and they make more money this way. Since making money is their primary cause, they see it as a good thing.
In the same way, although they are aware that they bother, irritate, or even outrage former givers by sending out reminder after reminder about all the giving opportunities available to previous donaters, they know that they will receive more money, overall, by doing this.
Unfortunately, some gut part of me reacts objectionably to this, and I cannot in good conscience send money their way.
And too bad the ad is incredibly forgettable and badly done. Most people will not even pay attention to it.
It's a waste of time to put that on the air, the money is better spent elsewhere... Like paying to get a real in your face ad made, they need to not hold any punches, they need to be blunt.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Well I'm probably in the minority here. I have hugged a tree. I like trees. They don't complain, they look pretty, and they provide me with oxygen. And unlike with "higher" primates you can't get AIDS or any other social disease from hugging a tree. Trees rock, primates are mainly assholes.
It's not about punishing TelCos. It's about the Discovery Phase of such a trial. In the discovery phase we'd find out about who they tapped and what they listened to. That's important because knowing this admin, it's perfectly reasonable to suspect it possible that they might be lying when they said "we only tapped the phones of folks who spoke to overseas terror suspects."
Maybe. Just MAYBE, they listened to a few more people who weren't speaking to terror suspects. Maybe they even listened to purely domestic calls. Honestly the actions of this admin sound a heck of a lot like what Nixon was forced to resign over.
With the immunity in this bill, any lawsuit against TelCos is thrown out even beofre the discovery phase.
Ok, I'll bite.
the legislative issue on wiretapping was only whether or not a bunch of greedy lawyers want another set of deep pockets to go plundering
When Evil-X left me and my two teenaged daughters for another man (have you any idea what that did to the kids?) I was damned glad to have one of the "greedy lawyers" you hate so much. Likewise when I was forced into bankrupcy because the bitch had run my finances into the ground, I was damned glad I had a "greedy lawyer".
When I got a detached retina this year I was damned glad I had a "greedy surgeon", who charged a lot more than the lawyers. You, sir, have a jealousy problem. And no, IANAL. I do databases at work for a whole lot less maney than the doctors and lawyers I have been GLAD to pay.
Left wing leaders don't care about the spying. They just want another set of excuses to try and destroy the American economy
Odd, when the Republicans were in power everybody I knew was hurting financially, but then again I don't know many rich people.
even more than all their environmental regulation already has
I'm 56. When I was a kid, few had air conditionaing in their cars. But even when it was ninety five degrees farenheight you rolled the windows up driving through Sauget where Monsanto had their plant. Anybody who curses Nixon for signing the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act is either a polluter or an idiot, or too young to remember what it was like before environmental regulation.
Now I guess I need to go to the Biters Anonymous meetings again, because IHBT.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Ah yes, because all those career Democrat politicians are spending their lives working for a government..... But there's no vast left-wing conspiracy to take down the American economy.
Nationalize everything, and therefor, the government has a lot more power. I don't see what the Dems are doing as maliciously minded. I perfectly concede that they genuinely believe that everything would be better if they ran everything. It's just that, humans have tried socialism over and over again and it simply hasn't worked. You need to have private property and businesses for the economy to work. Everyone knows this. Even Cuba is now gradually increasing private property rights for individual farmers in a bid to increase its own production.
Of all great ironies, though, is that, if we step forward 100 years, Reagan and Clinton will be seen as more alike than apart, and similarly, Bush and Obama will both represent a more activist and centralized government.
This is my sig.