Money Talks Again

Updated to add this link to Greenwald who, as usual, covers the details and the impact.

Well, it looks like the money spread around by the telecom lobby did the job it was supposed to.
Via TPM:

It a not so surprising vote today 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.

The Senate voted on the Dodd/Feingold amendment, which would have stripped retroactive immunity from the surveillance bill just now. The final tally was 31-67; crossing over to vote nay were Sens. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Evan Bayh (D-IN), Daniel Inouye (D-HI), Tim Johnson (D-SD), Herb Kohl (D-WI), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Mark Pryor (D-AR), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ken Salazar (D-CO), Tom Carper (D-DE), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Jim Webb (D-VA), Ben Nelson (D-NE), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Kent Conrad (D-ND), and Debbie Stabenow (D-MI).

Note: I corrected this to show that Bayh is from Indiana not Iowa.

It is also important to note that the Feinstein "exclusivity" amendment to the FISA revision failed by a vote of 57 to 41 , thanks to another "painless filibuster" of precisely the type we were promised would not be tolerated on this bill. What this really means is that the Senate has voted to say that although they were passing a law governing surveillance, it was OK if Shrub decided that he didn't like it he could make up his own law instead. From Kagro at KOS

Exclusivity -- the purpose of the amendment that "failed" -- meant simply this: that the law they were passing was the law, and it was the governing authority for how surveillance could be conducted in America.

The Senate just rejected it, so that means that they're passing a law, but if a president decides later on that he thinks there's really some other controlling authority besides the law, that's OK.

Can someone remind me why we gave the Democrats the majority in Congress? While the House bill still doesn't contain immunity there is a very slim possibility this is not a dead issue but considering the majority in the Senate we are screwed.