Not All Bad News

It wasn't all bad news in the Senate yesterday. Senator Ted Kennedy arrived back in the Capitol to vote on the Medicare bill, which passed by a veto-proof 69 - 30 margin. A few weeks ago Kennedy's vote could have been critical as Senate Republicans blocked any movement on this legislation by only one vote. The GOP action on Medicare, or lack thereof, resulted in a huge backlash. Doctors were irate and the AMA has been running ads against Republican Senators across the country. Obviously, Republican Senators got the message that their action wasn't making some very wealthy people very happy. As always with the GOP...money talks.

Not surprisingly Shrub was happy about the FISA bill as it will probably save him from a prison sentence, but he is threatening to veto the Medicare bill. Interestingly, Mr. Straight Shooter was the ONE Senator who didn't vote today on Medicare. According to The Hill McSame wouldn't even say how he would've voted. Now that is what I call leadership! Of course, McShrub has his own private form of Medicare in the form of a very wealthy wife.

Losing Your Rights on the Cheap

Between now and last March 94 Congressman that call themselves Democrats switched their position on retroactive telecom immunity and flopped to the telecom side. How did that happen? What spectacular global event precipitated this mass migration to the dark side? You don't suppose money from the telecoms had anything to do with it do you? Our Congress persons are above that kind of stuff aren't they?

Not so fast.

House Democrats who flipped their votes to support retroactive immunity for telecom companies in last week’s FISA bill took thousands of dollars more from phone companies than Democrats who consistently voted against legislation with an immunity provision, according to an analysis by MAPLight.org.

In March, the House passed an amendment that rejected retroactive immunity. But last week, 94 Democrats who supported the March amendment voted to support the compromise FISA legislation, which includes a provision that could let telecom companies that cooperated with the government’s warrantless electronic surveillance off the hook.

The 94 Democrats who changed their positions received on average $8,359 in contributions from Verizon, AT&T and Sprint from January, 2005, to March, 2008, according to the analysis by MAPLight, a nonpartisan organization that tracks the connection between campaign contributions and legislative outcomes.

Looks like the price of your Constitution got moved to the bargain table. Who would have thought that you could have bought 94 Congress persons for the bargain price of $8,359 a piece? Who would have thought that your Congress persons would have sold your Constitution down the river for such a price? I could have probably been a little less enraged over this had the average price been in the 6 figures because we all know that most everyone has a price but 8 lousy damn dollars!

Rolled Again!

I'm about to hit the road again and head home to Atlanta. While I am driving (and trying to stay awake) the House will be having a sham debate and voting on George Bush and Steny Hoyer's disastrous and fatally flawed FISA bill. This bill is a complete cave in to the criminal George Bush and his equally criminal minions. It gives him and the telecoms everthing they want. I had mistakenly thought that the days of cowering before Bush were over but it looks like I was seriously wrong. I mean really, Bush's approval rating is 29%. But even though he is a complete lame duck he has somehow managed to roll the Democratic Majority Leadership one more time. Do you think Shrub has pictures of them doing disgusting things with animals or something? What other excuse could there be?

Last night on Keith Olbermann Keith's guest, legal scholar Jonathan Turley, called the new bill an "evisceration of the Fourth Amendment." He also stated "This bill has quite literally no public value for citizens or civil liberties."

This is not the way to start a weekend. If you can you might try calling your Congressman...I've emailed mine but he is a Shrub toady so it was a waste of time.

Used and Abused Again

Well, how does it feel to be used and abused one more time by your Democratic Congress. You know the one you thought you were electing to begin to restore some sense of sanity and the rule of law back into government. From the Washington Post...

Wiretap Compromise in Works
FISA Update May Hinge On Two Separate Votes

By Ellen Nakashima and Paul Kane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, March 4, 2008; A03

House and Senate Democratic leaders are headed into talks today that they say could lead to a breakthrough on legislation to revamp domestic surveillance powers and grant phone companies some form of immunity for their role in the administration's warrantless wiretapping program after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Notice the word "compromise" there. You might get the impression that Congress and the White House have been negotiating to beat the band and have reached an agreeable and "win/win" for both the telcos and the American people who were spied upon...whoops! Wrong again. The compromise is among the Democrats themselves on how best to make it look like they aren't completely useless "poopy heads". Read it and weep.

Some aides on Capitol Hill were discussing the potential for the House passing the Senate version but breaking it into two votes: one on the portion of the bill that deals with revising FISA provisions and a second on the immunity measure.

This procedural move would allow many Democrats to vote against immunity but still make its approval all but certain since almost every Republican and some centrist Democrats would vote in favor.

Mr 19% wins again and it didn't cost him a thing. He got everything he wanted and you, my friend, get shit. It's galling enough to have been treated to this whole show of respect for our civil rights by the Dems but now we are expected to swallow this whole episode as some noble exercise in governance. Here is Kenneth Wainstein, assistant attorney general for national security explaining this grand exercise in screwing the American public and ignoring the Constitution.

Kenneth Wainstein, assistant attorney general for national security, said at the same meeting that key issues surrounding the legislation had been hashed out in a "long and tedious" but "healthy" process, aimed at updating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

"This is not amnesty," Wainstein said at the meeting. "This is targeted immunity" for companies who meet requirements specified in the Senate bill that include having received an attorney general's certification that their assistance was determined to be lawful.

Oh! that's all peachy keen then. The attorney general gets to say what is legal and what is not. You don't mean the same AG that told us that the rule of law was for suckers just last week do you? That "Attorney General" gets to certify this new power is "lawful?" I feel better already.

So where do we stand! I guess what the Democrats in Congress are telling you is that you had better damn well be comfortable with allowing unlimited, warrantless electronic surveillance and datamining of the communications of all Americans and indeed the entire world on the say-so of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and/or David Addington, with no possibility that they will ever agree to answer any questions you may ever have about it? That means there is no oversight, no restrictions and we are trust the Bush administration with knowing what is right and doing what is right. We have had six-plus years of experience with this president and his gang to know how well that's going to work.

They'll Never Tell

Is this a great country or what? According the Supremes you can't sue over being secretly wiretapped by the government unless you can prove you were wiretapped and the only proof is in the government's hands and it is secret. You lose!We lose!

It begs the question of why there can't be a panel convened that has the proper clearance to review who was in fact wiretapped illegally and let them be notified. It might be, of course, that there were so many illegal actions that it is an impossible task. Even if it only applied to people that have made overseas calls the number would be huge. I know from experience that the government default action is to capture everything and then sort through it later. We'll never know. Well you might know when no one can explain why, all of a sudden, you are on the no fly list.

Is this a great country or what?

Christy over at Firedoglake has all the legal beagle stuff.

Filibuster Time

Now he gets a little starch in his shorts! After a year of allowing Republicans to filibuster every bill offered by merely declaring their intent, Harry Reid has now decided that he's going to demand real filibusters from obstructionist senators. How disappointing is this? Especially so when you see that the target of this new rule is none other than Chris Dodd. I sure would like to see Mr. Reid explain how this makes sense for the goals of the Democrats.

What I would really like to see would be Clinton and Obama make an appearance in the Senate and stand together with Dodd on his filibuster of the FISA bill. Not that I think these two will leave the campaign trail but it would be nice. It would be great to see one or both of them showing some real leadership on this.

Something Positive

Senator Dodd spent 10 hours on the floor of the Senate yesterday in spite of the 76 to 10 cloture vote to grant immunity to the telecoms for the unwarranted spying on Americans since before 9/11. Harry Ried finally pulled the bill until January...so we have a stay. Thank you Senator Dodd.

Thanks to the 10 Democratic Senators who stood up for our Fourth Amendment rights yesterday.
Boxer - California
Brown - Ohio
Cantwell - Washington
Cardin - Maryland
Dodd - Connecticut
Feingold - Wisconsin
Harkin - Iowa
Kerry - Massachussetts
Menendez - New Jersey
Wyden - Oregon

The other 76 Senators who voted to ignore your rights under the Fourth can go to hell.

What Do The Have On Reid?

Should be an interesting day in the Senate. Supposedly, Harry Reid will bring a FISA fix bill to the floor today, this is supposed to be a bill that corrects some of the worst problems with the Protect America Act. That's the bill that Congress rushed through last August just before recess because of some fake "threats" supposedly by al Qaeda.

Here is the deal. Yesterday, the Senate received a closed door briefing from DNI McConnell, and AG Mukasey. I can't imagine what kind of sunshine was pumped up kilts by McConnell and Mukasey in order to scare the Senators this time? What dire calamity will befall America if the Telcos don't get retroactive immunity? Maybe Osama will steal Christmas. The administration is dead set on granting retroactive immunity to the Telcos and I can imagine will do anything to keep the whole story on the back burner.

The show is all about Telco immunity this time and the choice is Harry Reid's. He has a choice of which of two bills he can bring to the floor. The Intelligence Committee reported out their "fix" of the bill which includes Telco amnesty. The Judiciary Committee reported one that doesn't include it.

Fourteen members of Reid's caucus, including all of the presidential candidates, are on record expressly asking Reid to to make the FISA bill passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee (SJC) the base bill to be considered on the Senate floor. That's the one that doesn't include amnesty. Or he can bring the bill that the administration wants to the floor that will be more likely to keep the record of illegal spying by this administration hidden from the courts.

Word has it that Reid is going to reject the request of his fellow Democrats, and bring Telco amnesty to the floor in the form of the Intelligence Committee bill. I have absolutely no idea why he thinks this is a good idea. Remember that Chris Dodd has stated his intent to place a hold on any amnesty bill, and even mount a potential filibuster by his own caucus. Reid intends to offer the Judiciary bill as an amendment to Intelligence committee bill which pretty much means it will fail. You really have to ask yourself whose side Reid is on.

Here's what the NYT editorial page has to say:

Mr. Bush, of course, wants fewer, not more, restrictions and wants those powers to be made permanent. He also wants amnesty for telecommunications companies that gave Americans’ private data to the government for at least five years without a warrant.

Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, seems intent on doing the president’s bidding. He has indicated that instead of the Judiciary Committee’s bill, he may put on the floor a deeply flawed measure from the Senate Intelligence Committee that dangerously expands the government’s powers and gives undeserved amnesty to the telecommunications companies. The White House says amnesty is intended to ensure future cooperation but seems truly aimed at making sure the public never learns the extent of the companies’ involvement in illegal wiretapping.

That will leave Democratic senators like Christopher Dodd and Russ Feingold in the absurd position of having to stage filibusters against their own party’s leadership to try to forestall more harm to civil liberties.

If Reid does go this way he will not only be going against Feingold and Dodd but also be going against Senators Biden, Clinton, and Obama, all of whom promised to support Dodd's filibuster, if it became necessary.

I have a real fear that Reid is not going to stand up to Shrub on this and I would sure like to know why. We need some real leadership in the Senate and this would be a good place to start.

Promises, Promises

The following is an exchange between Keith Olbermann and Jonathan Turley, a Constitutional Law professor. From Crooks and Liars

Olbermann: “With or without this new law, suppose one of the anti-wiretapping civil lawsuits succeeds, what does that legal victory actually mean then in terms of stopping the government or punishing Alberto Gonzales or any other top officials who were responsible for this?”

Turley: “Well, it can mean a lot and that’s one of the reasons there’s a lot of people, both Democrats and Republicans, who don’t want to see it happen. They don’t want a court to say that the president did something that is a federal crime. That’s why they’re trying to get all these cases thrown out of court because it is rather clear that what the president ordered was a federal crime, clearly defined in federal law. But that causes a problem because many of the Democratic leaders and Republican leaders have promised each other that they would not start impeachment proceedings, but when a federal judge says the president committed a crime, it’s pretty darn hard to ignore that.”

What I want to understand is what the hell this means...

many of the Democratic leaders and Republican leaders have promised each other that they would not start impeachment proceedings

Does this mean the Republicans have promised the Dems that they won't impeach Bush if the Dems promise not too? What the hell?

He is a criminal and needs to be impeached. At least one U.S. District Judge has already stated that Bush has broken the law...

U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor struck down the NSA program, which she said violates the rights to free speech and privacy.

The defendants “are permanently enjoined from directly or indirectly utilizing the Terrorist Surveillance Program in any way, including, but not limited to, conducting warrantless wiretaps of telephone and Internet communications, in contravention of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and Title III,” she wrote.

She declared that the program “violates the separation of powers doctrine, the Administrative Procedures Act, the First and Fourth amendments to the United States Constitution, the FISA and Title III.”

Her ruling went on to say that “the president of the United States … has undisputedly violated the Fourth in failing to procure judicial orders.”

source

Your Cell Phone Is Not Your Friend

I wonder why everyone that has commented on the following story about being tracked by cellular phone seems kind of shocked that you can do this. I guess I assume everyone that uses a cell phone has a fundamental grasp of the technology. My bad.

Under the older/earlier technology you could be triangulated fairly accurately if there were multiple towers within reach. With the new enhanced 911 this gets even more accurate. The newest technology includes a GPS receiver in the phone itself that can report your exact location within a few yards. You currently cannot turn it off without turning off the phone and have no control over when or to whom it is reporting your position.

The bottom line is that if don't want to be tracked everywhere you go then turn off your cell phone.

Federal officials are routinely asking courts to order cellphone companies to furnish real-time tracking data so they can pinpoint the whereabouts of drug traffickers, fugitives and other criminal suspects, according to judges and industry lawyers.

In some cases, judges have granted the requests without requiring the government to demonstrate that there is probable cause to believe that a crime is taking place or that the inquiry will yield evidence of a crime. Privacy advocates fear such a practice may expose average Americans to a new level of government scrutiny of their daily lives.

Such requests run counter to the Justice Department's internal recommendation that federal prosecutors seek warrants based on probable cause to obtain precise location data in private areas. The requests and orders are sealed at the government's request, so it is difficult to know how often the orders are issued or denied.

The issue is taking on greater relevance as wireless carriers are racing to offer sleek services that allow cellphone users to know with the touch of a button where their friends or families are. The companies are hoping to recoup investments they have made to meet a federal mandate to provide enhanced 911 (E911) location tracking. Sprint Nextel, for instance, boasts that its "loopt" service even sends an alert when a friend is near, "putting an end to missed connections in the mall, at the movies or around town."

With Verizon's Chaperone service, parents can set up a "geofence" around, say, a few city blocks and receive an automatic text message if their child, holding the cellphone, travels outside that area.

"Most people don't realize it, but they're carrying a tracking device in their pocket," said Kevin Bankston of the privacy advocacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation. "Cellphones can reveal very precise information about your location, and yet legal protections are very much up in the air."

A Little Starch

Updated below:

Not being the front runner in the Democratic nomination race seems to have put a little starch into Senator Chris Dodd's demeanor. He seems a lot more eager and ready of late to take a lead in standing up for what is right. Angered by Mukasey's Senate testimony last week in which the former federal judge and prosecutor floated a legal "theory" that the President of the United States could, indeed, stand above constitutional statutes, Dodd declared on Monday:

"That is about as basic as it gets," Dodd said. "You must obey the law. Everyone must."

Senator Dodd, along with a considerable number of other legal and political observers were also upset when Mukasey dodged questions last week about whether or not so-called "waterboarding" was, in fact, torture. After dancing around giving a straight answer for a while, he wound up making the strange statement that he wasn't quite sure what was meant by the term "waterboarding".

Dodd's is also rejecting any "do-overs" on these key issues. He is rejecting any mulligans for a nominee who refuses to call torture by its proper name. Dodd's firm position is forcing the hand of some like Dianne Feinstein of California and Carl Levin of Michigan who were warning they might vote against Mukasey if he doesn't properly clarify his views. I agree with Dodd that you should be held to your first answer and not be allowed to "test" the limits of what you can get away with during the questioning.

Let's hope Dodd's leadership on these issues carry over in the immunity for telecoms and other serious constitutional issues.

Update: Jane Hamsher at Firedoglake informs us that HRC is on board in rejecting Mukasey as well. Good for her.

Some Guts and Principle

I am gaining a whole lot of respect for Senator Chris Dodd. He seems to be the only one willing to stand up to the current do nothing scenario (I mean kiss George Bush's ass) and do something constructive to prevent a further erosion of our civil rights.

http://action.chrisdodd.com/...

The Military Commissions Act. Warrantless wiretapping. Shredding of Habeas Corpus. Torture. Extraordinary Rendition. Secret Prisons.

No more.

I have decided to place a "hold" on the latest FISA bill that would have included amnesty for telecommunications companies that enabled the President's assault on the Constitution by illegaly[sic]providing personal information on their customers without judicial authorization.

I said that I would do everything I could to stop this bill from passing, and I have.

It's about delivering results -- and as I've said before, the FIRST thing I will do after being sworn into office is restore the Constitution. But we shouldn't have to wait until then to prevent the further erosion of our country's most treasured document. That's why I am stopping this bill today.

Click on the link above to thank Senator Dodd for responding to your call.