Get Ready For The SuperSizeMe Fearmongering ... House Passes - Without Immunity - New FISA Bill

The Garlic seconds, and joins in heartily, Jane Hamsher's call for "Lets have a party!"

The Congress beat back the lies and fearmongering, and passed the new FISA Bill, by a count of 213-197-1.

From Glenn Greenwald;

"As impressive as the House vote itself was, more impressive still was the floor debate which preceded it. I can't recall ever watching a debate on the floor of either House of Congress that I found even remotely impressive -- until today. One Democrat after the next -- of all stripes -- delivered impassioned, defiant speeches in defense of the rule of law, oversight on presidential eavesdropping, and safeguards on government spying. They swatted away the GOP's fear-mongering claims with the dismissive contempt such tactics deserve, rejecting the principle that has predominated political debate in this country since 9/11: that the threat of the Terrorists means we must live under the rule of an omnipotent President and a dismantled constitutional framework."

So, what next?

If they stay-to-form ...

The Commander Guy, eyes slanted, lips pursed, sounding very much like someone who hasn't taken their meds, will vent against it, promising to veto it, if he doesn't get his ass-saving Telcom Immunity, and, accusing the Democrats of leaving the country at the mercy of terrorists.

Since its long established that facts, truth and losing a vote battle are mere fleas on an elephant, the GOP (perhaps another tearful performance from John Boehner), the Freakshow and other nitwits, will be screaming to the high heavens on how the Democrats are making the country unsafe, complete with vivid tales of nefarious terrorists, apparently hanging around right offshore, on the ready to bounce on us and kill all our families.

And on and on ...

Time to cue up Que Sera Sera...


Bonus Links

House Clerk: FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 145

James Oliphant: FISA bill passes House; time for Spring Break '08!

CNN: House challenges Bush on surveillance

The Gavel: House Passes FISA Amendments Act

Bush Grindhouse Launches "We Want Angel Back" Approach Over Telcom Amnesty

OMG! ... The Country Is Still Safe, and Standing!

Minced Garlic - New Keith Olbermann Special Comment: To Bush - "You're A Fascist! ... You're A Liar"

Another strong - even very animated - Special Comment last evening from MSNBC Countdown host, Keith Olbermann, which had him leaning into the camera to call The Commander Guy a "Fascist" and "A Liar".




Olbermann also presented this Special Comment in a slightly different format.









Rather than his customary last segment of the program, Olbermann segued from the #3 story on 'Countdown', "On FISA and telecom immunity", introducing the recent Bush Grindhouse's efforts to play the Fear Card, and of, perhaps the most startling event of the day - The House Democrats showing a stiff spine and the House Republicans showing they care more about politics than the their own chamber, not to mention the rule-of-law, the Constitution, et all.

Rather than bring up the FISA Bill and give The Bush Grindhouse their most cherished Telcom Immunity (about the only reason they're - once again - beefing up the FISA Bill ... The Protect America Act really should be retitled to Protect The Telecommunication Companies Act ... Read Glenn Greenwald's FISA 101 for an excellent overview of it).

Instead, the House Leadership decided to remind its' members that two of the Bush Henchmen and Henchwoman have thumbed their noses at Congress, so the matter of declaring Harriet Meirs and Josh Bolten in Contempt of Congress was on the agenda, so John "Cry Baby" Boehner led a walkout of the Republicans (this after they busted the Dem's balls, by playing procedural games, interrupting a memorial service for Rep. Tom Lantos, who passed away earlier this week).

The Contempt measures were passed and, as of midnight tomorrow evening, the FISA Bill extension will expire, which has lead the Bush Grindhouse to go to great lengths this past week, to browbeat the Congress into giving the Telcom Immunity, otherwise, the intelligence-gathering program comes to a halt (it doesn’t) and that the dreaded terrorist will soon be invading our country to kill us all.

So, in essence, other than the new component of the Telcom Immunity, it has been business-as-usual for the Bush Grindhouse and the Republicans.

Play the Fear Card, overstate and outright lie about the threats and then turn around and label anyone that questions them as traitors, terrorist appeasers and people who would rather see the terrorists win.

Much like many of us, we had enough of this, and Olbermann teed off on it in his Special Comment.

"You have subjected us, your citizens, to that greater danger! This, Mr. Bush, is simple enough for even you to understand.

For the moment, at least, thanks to some true patriots in the House, and your own stubbornness, you have tabled telecom immunity, and the FISA act.

You. By your own terms and your definitions, you have just sided with the terrorists. You’ve got to have this law, or we’re all going to die. But, practically speaking, you vetoed this law.

It is bad enough, sir, that you were demanding an ex post facto law that could still clear the AT&Ts and the Verizons from responsibility for their systematic, aggressive and blatant collaboration with your illegal and unjustified spying on Americans under this flimsy guise of looking for any terrorists who are stupid enough to make a collect call or send a mass e-mail.

But when you demanded it again during the State of the Union address, you wouldn’t even confirm that they actually did anything for which they deserved to be cleared.

“The Congress must pass liability protection for companies believed to have assisted in the efforts to defend America.”

Believed? Don’t you know? Don’t you even have the guts Dick Cheney showed in admitting they did collaborate with you? Does this endless presidency of loopholes and fine print extend even here? If you believe in the seamless mutuality of government and big business, come out and say it! There is a dictionary definition, one word that describes that toxic blend.

You’re a fascist — get them to print you a T-shirt with fascist on it! What else is this but fascism? ..."

And before a strong, flourishing finish, Olbermann laid these down;

"And if there’s one thing we know about Big Brother, Mr. Bush, it is that he is — you are — a liar."

"This is crap. And you sling it with an audacity and a speed unrivaled by even the greatest political felons of our history."

"You are a liar, Mr. Bush. And after showing some skill at it, you have ceased to even be a very good liar."

Check out and read Keith Olbermann's Special Comment "A veto of the FISA bill endangers Americans"

Watch The Video of it Here


Bonus Links

dday at Hullabaloo: Wahhhh, Wahhhh, Wahhhh

Atrios: They Write Letters - Congressman Reyes writes to President Bush

Scarecrow at Firedoglake: We Need a Constitutional Democratic Party

FISA Update #4 - Don't Let the Fat Lady - Or The Fat Corporate Cats - Sing!

FISA Update #4 - Don't Let the Fat Lady - Or The Fat Corporate Cats - Sing!

SIGN THIS PETITION!

We did two posts yesterday (that you can see here and here) on the collapse of our democracy, with the U.S. Senate caving in to give the Bush Grindhouse their Stay Out of Jail Card, passing the Protect American Act, which included immunity for the telecommunication companies that bought the "It's legal" bullshit.

Scarecrow, from Firedoglake, gets our spotlight today;

"The Fourth Amendment has been handed down to us unchanged for over two centuries:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Almost none of that is left if today's bill stands. In an age in which "bipartisan" has come to mean weak Democrats joining unanimous Republicans to vote against the Constitution, the Fourth Amendment would be eviscerated by a bill that provides a virtual blank check for the executive to invade the privacy of Americans ..."

In the post, Scarecrow offers a link to a petition that Firedoglake has started, to urge the House of Representatives to reverse this action by their cowardly brothers, when the two houses meet in conference to bang it out.

Tell House Members to Stand Firm Behind the RESTORE Act!

The FISA bill passed by the Senate is a disgrace. By legalizing warrantless spying on Americans and granting retroactive amnesty to lawbreaking telecoms, the Senate seeks to ensure that the Bush administration's illegal spying programs are never investigated or subjected to the rule of law. The Senate bill is a profound betrayal of the votes of millions of Americans who voted in 2006 to put Democrats in control of Congress in order to increase, not eliminate, checks and oversight on this administration, and to restore the rule of law to our country.

The House's RESTORE Act is an infinitely superior bill. It provides real safeguards on the President's spying powers while providing him with the surveillance powers he needs to protect the country. It enables the issue of the legality of the President's spying programs to be decided where it belongs -- in a court of law. And it preserves the crucial balance that has existed for decades between enabling necessary surveillance on Americans and ensuring that our political leaders do not abuse that power.

In the wake of the discovery of the Watergate crimes and decades of surveillance abuses, the Congress of the mid-1970s acted on a bipartisan basis to put into place safeguards to ensure that even our highest political officials must adhere to the law and can only exercise eavesdropping powers with real safeguards. The RESTORE Act continues that tradition, while the Senate bill eviscerates it. We urge Democratic House members to stand firm behind the bill they passed and not capitulate once again to the bullying, manipulative demands of the Bush administration for ever-greater unchecked power, as embodied by the warrantless eavesdropping and telecom immunity provisions of the Senate bill.

Go here, to Firedoglake, and sign the petition and take part in, hopefully, getting this thing straight.

SIGN THIS PETITION!

FISA Update #2 - Who Are These Men That Sold Out Our Democracy Today!

Rather than add a rather long "Update #2", to Today's Must Read - Glenn Greenwald's "Amnesty Day for Bush and lawbreaking telecoms" posted earlier today, a separate post is warranted.

As you can imagine, an avalanche of reaction, to this dark, dark day our elected U.S. Senate has put upon this country.

Who Are These Men That Sold Out Our Democracy Today!

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 110th Congress - 2nd Session; Question: On the Amendment (Dodd Amdt. No. 3907 ); Statement of Purpose: To strike the provisions providing immunity from civil liability to electronic communication service providers for certain assistance provided to the Government.


Paul Kiel, from TPMmuckraker

"Let there be no doubt: a majority of senators, and a large number of Democrats, think the telecoms should not suffer the hazard of accountability for cooperating with the administration's warrantless wiretapping program. Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) took to the floor last night to give a speech asking, "This is our defining question, the question that confronts every generation: The rule of law, or the rule of men?" The resounding answer: the rule of men."

Steve Benen, from The Carpetbagger Report

"For the 18 Dems who went along with this nonsense, I’d love to hear an explanation. For the Republicans, not even one GOP senator was willing to take a stand for the rule of law. Not one ...

And what arguments were presented by the other side? Not much — a few lies about the cooperation coming in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, and a basic understanding that Republicans had to go along with the wishes of Mr. 28% at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue."

Presidential candidates Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Barack Obama (D-IL) were present for the vote – voting nay and yea, respectively ... Hillary Clinton and Lindsey Graham did not vote."

Taylor Marsh

"What a shell Congress is from its former greatness ... Bush gets away with illegal wiretapping and so do the companies that helped him do it ... Bush gets away with the Iraq war, all without any consequences whatsoever ... No wonder more and more people are registering as Independents"

Kagro X, on Daily Kos - "US Senate commits suicide on national television"


Update #3

"The Senate had "just sanctioned" the "single largest invasion of privacy in the history of the country,"

Paul Kiel from TPMmuckraker - Dodd: It's up to The House

"The Senate had "just sanctioned" the "single largest invasion of privacy in the history of the country," he said. When asked why he thought so many Dem senators had crossed over, he replied: "Unfortunately, those who are advocating this notion that you have to give up liberties in order to be more secure are apparently prevailing. They seem to be convincing people that you're at risk politically or we're at risk as a nation if we don't give up rights."

Today's Must Read - Glenn Greenwald's "Amnesty Day for Bush and lawbreaking telecoms"

What if Spartacus was voting in the Senate today, on the Protect America Act, the FISA bill update?

We suspect that Spartacus wouldn't bend over the American people, and violently sodomize them, the way our elected U.S. Senate is about to do today.

We believe Spartacus would rise to the occasion (no pun intended) to protect, not persecute, to do what is right, to follow and protect the Constitution and, lastly, he would buck and revolt against the Emperor, for attempting this hijacking of the laws of the country.

When the sun sets today, it may well install a permanent darkness on the U.S. Senate, marking it, for decades to come, as the august chamber's saddest day.

Glenn Greenwald, of Salon, has a most sobering, depressing account of the whole sordid affair, in "Amnesty Day for Bush and lawbreaking telecoms";

"All sorts of "controversy" erupted from that story. Democrats everywhere expressed dramatic, unbridled outrage, vowing that this would not stand. James Risen and Eric Lichtblau were awarded Pulitzer Prizes for exposing this serious lawbreaking. All sorts of Committees were formed, papers written, speeches given, conferences convened, and editorials published to denounce this extreme abuse of presidential power. This was illegality and corruption at the highest level of government, on the grandest scale, and of the most transparent strain."

And Greenwald than asks, rhetorically, "What was the outcome of all of that sturm und drang? What were the consequences for the President for having broken the law so deliberately and transparently?"

"Absolutely nothing. To the contrary, the Senate is about to enact a bill which has two simple purposes: (1) to render retroactively legal the President's illegal spying program by legalizing its crux: warrantless eavesdropping on Americans, and (2) to stifle forever the sole remaining avenue for finding out what the Government did and obtaining a judicial ruling as to its legality: namely, the lawsuits brought against the co-conspiring telecoms. In other words, the only steps taken by our political class upon exposure by the NYT of this profound lawbreaking is to endorse it all and then suppress any and all efforts to investigate it and subject it to the rule of law."

And this, as Greenwald notes, is happening in a Democrat-led, Democrat-majority Senate!

Maybe I missed the MoveOn.Org memo, that the 2006 elections, of having the Democrats take back the Congress, was all about greenlighting, aiding and abetting the Bush Grindhouse, and their executive power-grab.

And we have Harry "Give'em What They Want" Reid, the Senate Majority Leader (now there's a deafening oxymoron) to thank for this.

Greenwald closes with this;

"From Frank Church and the bipartisan oversight protections of the post-Watergate abuses in the mid-1970s to Jay Rockefeller, Dick Cheney, legalized warrantless eavesdropping and retroactive telecom amnesty in 2008 -- that vivid collapse into the sewer illustrates as potently as anything could what has happened to this country over the last eight years."

Update! Update!

Just as I am posting this, news is breaking on the voting

From Jane Hamsher, over on Firedoglake;

"Update: Woo hoo! You lose. Dodd's amendment to strip retroactive immunity fails spectacularly, 31-67. I have to say that what constantly amazes me is just how damn little it costs corporate America to buy our elected officials. Pennies on the dollar, really, for what they get."

From KBusch on BlueMassGroup;

The following Democratic Senators just voted for telecom immunity.

Jay Rockefeller WV
Evan Bayh IA
Daniel Inouye HI
Tim Johnson SD
Herb Kohl WI
Mary Landrieu LA
Claire McCaskill MO
Mark Pryor AR
Blanche Lincoln AR
Dianne Feinstein CA
Ken Salazar CO
Tom Carper DE
Barbara Mikulski MD
Jim Webb VA

Read the Greenwald piece anyway, it's very good ... And, it's playing out, pretty much, as he foresaw

As we stated above, a very, very dark day!

And, just late last month, The Garlic gave the Senate all the advise they would need in this fight

Minced Garlic: New Keith Olbermann Special Comment ... Bush put telecoms ahead of citizens

Sorry we're late with our usual highlighting of, yet another stellar, Keith Olbermann Special Comment, fumed and ranted Thursday evening (For one, The Garlic has been working at half-speed the past few days, a bit under-the-weather and, MSNBC was a bit slow in posting the transcript).

Olbermann tackled the FISA fiasco, and was particularly steamed throughout the special comment.

The Garlic already had its' rant on this last Monday, offering the Democrats in Congress two reasons not to cave in on this issue.

For The Commander Guy, his henchmen (and the entire Republican Freakshow echo machine) has done purple-in-the-face, demanding Congress give The Commander Guy HIS FISA Bill, his Orwellian 'Protect America Act', for if they don't, terrorists are going to immediately invade the country and kill us all.

Being the current law works just fine (assuming, the people working it are honest and law-abiding), and it's been crystal clear this fevered push for The Commander Guy's PAA is about giving immunity to the telecommunications companies that broke the law with them.

With every dam, there comes a crack;

Which is why the Vice President probably shouldn't have phoned in to the Rush Limbaugh Propaganda-Festival yesterday.

Sixth sentence out of Mr. Cheney's mouth.

The FYCA bill is about, quote, "retroactive liability protection for the companies that have worked with us and helped us prevent further attacks against the United States."

Oops.

Mr. Cheney is something of a loose cannon, of course.

But he kind of let the wrong cat out of the bag there.

Because Mr. Bush and the corporations he values more than people didn't want anybody to verify what Mark Klein says.

Mark Klein is the AT&T Whistleblower who appeared on this newscast last November... who explained, in the placid, dull terms of your local neighborhood IT desk, how he personally attached all of AT&T's circuits, everything carrying every phone call, every e-mail, every bit of web browsing into a secure room — Room Number 641-A, at the Folsom Street facility in San Francisco, where it was all copied so the government could look at it.

Not some of it; not just the international part of it; certainly not just the stuff some truly patriotic and telepathic spy might be able to divine had been sent or spoken by or to a terrorist.

Everything.

Every time you looked at a naked picture, every time you bid on eBay, every time you phoned-in a donation to a Democrat.

"My thought was 'George Orwell's 1984,'" Mr. Klein told me, reflecting back, "and here I am, being forced to connect the Big Brother machine."

And there was this chewy morsel of a caveat;

There's yet another level to this, and here we move from Big Brother to Sleazy Son.

Mr. Bush's new Attorney General, Mr. Mukasey, the one who has already taken four different positions on water-boarding, and who may yet tie that record on this subject of telecom immunity, he has a very personal stake in this.

There happens to be a partner in the law firm of Bracewell and Giuliani, named Marc Mukasey. And Bracewell and Giuliani and the Attorney General's son Marc, just happen to represent Verizon.

You know, Verizon — Telecom Giant.

And all of a sudden this is no longer just a farce in which "protecting the Telecoms" is dressed up for us as, "protecting us from terrorist conference calls."

Now it begins to look like the bureaucrats of the Third Reich trying to protect the Krupp Family industrial giants by literally re-writing the laws for their benefit.

And we know how that turned out: Alfried Krupp and eleven of his directors were convicted of War Crimes at Nuremburg.

Hmmm ... The new Crony General has a personal stake in this ... Very interesting ...That is, of course, the Crony General admits to having son ...

Why, just the other day, the Crony General displayed his prowess;

From Glenn Greenwalds' "Mukasey's radical worldview is now the norm";

While Mukasey may be marginally more straightforward than Alberto Gonzales was -- more willing to conform to the procedural formalities of independence -- he is, ideologically, a clone of John Yoo and David Addington and is as much of a loyal adherent to the Bush/Cheney extremist worldview as Gonzales ever was.

Mukasey explicitly embraces the most extreme theories of presidential omnipotence and lawlessness and displays as much Cheney-ite contempt for the notion of Congressional oversight as the Vice President himself. He repeatedly endorsed patently illegal behavior -- including torture -- and refused even to pretend that he cared what the Senate thought about any of it. He even told Republican Senators that they have no right to pass a whistleblower law allowing federal employees who learn of lawbreaking to inform Congress about it, because such a law would infringe on the President's constitutional powers. In Mukasey's worldview, the President has unlimited power and Congress has none.

And Dahlia Lithwick, over on Slate, from her "Thank You. Now Go to Hell.Mukasey stonewalls Senate Democrats on water-boarding, and practically everything else.";

Over the course of a long, maddening day, it's quickly manifest that Mukasey's legal opinions have a 30-second shelf life. He won't opine on what's happened in the past and he won't opine on anything that might happen in the future. When Sen. Arlen Specter—concerned about seven years of vast new claims of executive authority—asks Mukasey whether, in his view, the president "can break any law he pleases because he's the president—including, say, statutes banning torture," as well as FISA and the National Security Act, Mukasey replies, "I can't contemplate any situation in which this president would assert Article II authority to do something that the law forbids."

"Well, he did just that when he violated the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act," Specter shoots back. Mukasey's response? "Both of those issues have been brought within statutes."

Specter is flabbergasted: "But he acted in violation of statutes, didn't he?"

"I don't know," Mukasey replies. But does is really matter? What's past is past.

And Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., tries to get Mukasey to explain why the Justice Department is investigating the destruction of the CIA torture tapes, but not investigating the underlying torture itself.

Mukasey's reply, "I don't start investigations out of curiosity," speaks for itself. When Whitehouse tries to get Mukasey to agree that they both know enough classified information to have a very concrete, nonspeculative legal discussion about whether what happened on those tapes is legal, Mukasey again insists that whether or not what happened on those tapes is legal is about which "certifications were given" and "who permissibly relied on it." Whitehouse calls this the "Nuremberg defense. ... I had authorization and therefore I'm immune from prosecution."

Any doubt that Crony General will go after those undertaking the illegal wiretapping?

Me thinks pigs will fly before that ever happens


Read Keith Olbermann's Special Comment "Bush put telecoms ahead of citizens; Pres. Bush demands a law which would clear phone giants from responsibility for government's unjustified spying on Americans"

Watch The Special Comment Video

Hey, Dems, Let'em Veto It! ... Here's All The Ammunition You Need!

There is a small, but fascinating. drama that is to play out in the nation's capital today.

Before sunset, the Senate resumes its' debate, and possible vote, on the Protect America Act, the FISA Bill that the Bush Grindhouse wants, the one that will give immunity to the telecommunications companies that went along with them in breaking the law.

After sunset, the Lame Duck Commander Guy will take to the podium, before a joint session of Congress, and deliver his final (Thank God!) State of the Union address.

Whether he crows, or carps, all depends on what happens in the Senate.

No doubt the Stepford Republicans will continue to block, and otherwise attempt to bully through what the Bush Grindhouse wants.

They, along with the Bush Grindhouse will be laying down the vibe - as they have all along - of fearmongering, claiming the Democrats will get us killed while they, thumping their chests, are the protectors.

Trust us, we'll take care of you ...

Fat chance.

So, Harry Reid, and all you other Democrats, here's your ammunition.

Bush Lied!

Over 935 times (and that's just a couple of years) on the threats to the country, to justify his preemptive, colossal mistake, in taking us into Iraq.

While we have all known this, it was documented last week... And with a searchable database, in case you want to cherry pick some of the juicy lies.

But wait, there's more bullets.

Why not force the Stepford Republican to explain, and justify, The Commander Guy's giving up on capturing Osama bin Laden?

Have them explain the need to continue this illegal wiretapping program, and the need to give immunity, because, if the bill isn't passed, the terrorists are going to come and get us.

Have him explain how his illegal wiretapping is only capturing the conversation of terrorists, and not American citizens.

Point out, that their fearless leader has already given up ... That he's content to pass it along to the next president, the justice due Osama bin Laden.

So much for the Republican being our protectors.

The Commander Guy has indicated he will veto the bill, if it is not exactly how it wants it.

Fine.

Let'em veto it! ... Let'em go out, and continue his lying, for he is the Emperor with no clothes! ...

Perhaps, someone, like Senator Feingold, or Senator Whitehouse, can read into the record the Bush Lying Report.

Let's have Senator Kennedy, or Senator Boxer read into the record the interview in which The Commander Guy says he's passing Osama bin Laden onto the next administration.

Let's hear from Lawrence Wright, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower, on how he was wiretapped, and threatened.

The New England Patriots landed in Arizona last night, to fight for the Super Bowl.

It long past due that few patriots stand up and fight in Congress.

For all you Senators, vote against the bill, deny the immunity and let The Commander Guy piss-and-moan his way out the door in less than a year!

Protect America ... Yes, indeed ... Protect us, please!


Bonus Must Reads

Glenn Greenwald: What's at stake today in the Senate's FISA filibuster vote

Paul Kiel/TPMmuckracker: Today's Must Read

American People 2 Bush Grindhouse 0

It wasn't exactly Bad Day at Black Rock, but pretty darn close.

The incredible display of both passion and, something not seen in the U.S. Congress in recent years, leadership, a dogged refusal to not cave in, stand up and say "No More", Senator Chris Dodd, and his threatened filibuster, forced the hand of Give'em What They Want Harry Reid this evening, with Reid tabling the FISA bill, containing retroactive immunity for the Bush Grindhouse illegal wiretapping accomplices, until next month.

From Crooks and Liars;

Logan Murphy made the vids and says:

In his closing speech Dodd vowed to filibuster again in January if telecom amnesty is still part of the FISA legislation. This speech should be watched by every student, every member of Congress as well as all Americans who value their civil liberties. No matter which presidential candidate you support, you can’t get around the fact that this is what REAL, American leadership looks like. Bravo Senator Dodd, BRAVO!

Matt Browner-Hamlin, Dodd Campaign Blogger: Constitution Protected...For Now

Jane Hamsher: BREAKING: REID PULLED TELECOM BILL

Greg Sargent - Breaking: Reid Pulls FISA Telecom Immunity Bill Off Senate Floor


And, on another front ...

CREW STATEMENT: FEDERAL JUDGE DECLARES WHITE HOUSE VISITOR RECORDS SUBJECT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT

Paul Kiel: Judge to White House: Nice Try

Yes, all those visits from Indian Activist Jack Abramoff, the other rightwing Soldiers of God, as well as who-knows-else to the Bush Grindhouse can now - possibly - be discerned.

Now, it ain't a done deal yet, as you can bet your private Social Security account, the Bush Grindhouse will lawyer this up long past the time they leave (preferably via indictment, or impeachment).

It's only one battle, not the whole shebang, but for tonight, bask in the glow of good triumphing over evil.

(I guess Orrin Hatch will have to sleep more nights with the boogeyterrorist under his bed)

God Bless Orrin Hatch ... Defending The Bush FISA, and Telcom Amnesty, He Indicts The Bush Grindhouse

Watching the FISA debate on C-Span 2, and Senator Chris Dodd's filibuster, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT), in growing passion, and increasing fearmongering, is defending the Bush Grindhouse in their practice of illegal wiretapping, and their call for immunity for the Telcom accomplices.

In his rambling, Hatch, citing the danger of lawsuits from citizens who have been illegally wiretapped, that it would put our national security in jeopardy, that it would expose classified information, offered this gem, something that fits like a glove to the Bush Cronies;

"There are people in this country who just love to expose classified information, regardless of who it harms ..."

Sound like, if they win their appeal, the Wilson's will have to subpoena Senator Hatch, to see what he knows about who loved to expose Valerie Plame, former covert CIA agent.

Heck, there's probably some tapes sitting in the NSA (unless they've adopted the CIA practice of destroying them) on it ...

Ahh, such irony.

More Wisdom From The Senator from Utah

Glenn Greenwald: The Grave and Epic War -- Spending time with Alberto Gonzales, Orrin Hatch and Russ Feingold

Think Progress: VIDEO: Hatch Says Banning Flag Burning Is ‘The Most Important Thing The Senate Could Be Doing’

Think Progress: Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT): ‘Nobody With Brains’ Denies That Hussein ‘Was Supporting al-Qaeda’