The Senate passed the FISA bill today, which effectively puts an end to any chance of legal repercussions for telcos who helped the government spy on citizens. Senator Obama voted for it, Senator McCain didn’t vote, and Senator Clinton, for what it’s worth, voted against it. Find out how your senator voted here. [TechCrunch]
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Can I get a complete list of the companies that went along with the wiretapping?
I’m going to switch my service now.
@CaliCheeseSucks: This poster from Alabama believes we need a lot more senators like Russ Feingold.
This bill sells out the Constitution’s 4th Amendment, pure and simple. It shields the Democrats who voted for it (covering their butts on ‘national security’ issues for their upcoming elections), and it shields the criminal acts performed by George W. Bush. (‘Criminal’ being the descriptions used by law professors of both liberal and conservative tilt.)
Goodbye civil liberties and privacy.
@dry-roasted-peanuts: “That covers just about everything. And this is coming from a very disenfranchised Republican. Warrentless wiretapping, detaining foreign nationals, a bloated budget, etc. That sure as hell isn’t a part of the “smaller, less intrusive federal government” ideology I signed on for.”
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It’s all wrong from a conservative view, and all wrong on liberal/progressive one. Somehow, our representatives have forgotten that we’re supposed to act BETTER than the -isms we’re supposed to be defeating.
@giggitygoo: If you think the spying was “limited in scope, only involving calls made by terrorists overseas”, then tell us how many instances of this extra-Constitutional spying took place. Go ahead. I’d be interested in seeing how many times this happened, being that it’s so “limited in scope”.
And, that number means that there are that many terrorist sympathizers in the US, correct? Or even, 1/10 of that, being generous (a 90% false positive rate would get any law enforcement chief fired in a NY second, right)?
@blackmage439: The problem with launching a criminal suit is proving standing. Courts have thrown out cases so far because the plaintiff couldn’t prove he/she had actually been wiretapped. Since the program is secret, it’s hard to see how anyone could actually prove they had standing to sue.
@giggitygoo: The idea that the telcoms didn’t believe they were breaking the law doesn’t pass the laugh test. Qwest’s lawyers figured out that this was illegal, and refused to cooperate. If they figured it out, the other telcomes could have too.
Rachel Maddow had a great line the other night — she said this was like granting immunity to the getaway driver in a bank heist because the thief told him bank robberies were legal.
@nerevar: Can I get a complete list of the companies that went along with the wiretapping?
I’m going to switch my service now.
Well then switch to Qwest because they are the only company to stand up to the government and say “NO”. Make sure to send a letter to the execs as well telling them why you switched to the company.
@dry-roasted-peanuts: That sure as hell isn’t a part of the “smaller, less intrusive federal government” ideology I signed on for. This republican ideology has never seems to actually be put into practice. The party talks a good story around election time but once they get the power in congress and or white house, it all seems to go out the window. Is it any wonder Bob Barr and the libertarian party are actually looking appealing and getting coverage, considering what the republican party actually does when in power.
@Tmoney02: You have to remember that when Republicans talk about “smaller, less intrusive federal government” they’re only referring to taxes. They’re perfectly happy to throw civil liberties under the bus as long as their pocketbooks are secure.
But Obama said he wouldn’t vote for it! I’m SHOCKED he didn’t keep his word.
Not to imply I don’t think the other dude running for President wouldn’t have done the same thing…but it wasn’t a smart move.
@giggitygoo:
1) The telecoms knew what they were doing was illegal. The part of FISA that makes this clear:
(a) Prohibited activities
A person is guilty of an offense if he intentionally-
(1) engages in electronic surveillance under color of law except as authorized by statute; or
(2) discloses or uses information obtained under color of law by electronic surveillance, knowing or having reason to know that the information was obtained through electronic surveillance not authorized by statute.
2) “At no point was a warrantless wiretap put into place between 2 US persons or between a US person and an international person who was not a known terror suspect.”
Of course that depends on your definition of “known terror suspect,” which, if I understand your line of thinking, is alarmingly whatever the government (read: executive branch) says that is. For what it’s worth, there was a significant ruling recently in a lawsuit brouht againt the Bush administration from a now-bankrupt Muslim charity based in Oregon where the JD accidently released a confidential transcript proving this exactly did happen. (Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation Inc. v. Bush) An insider at AT&T also revealed that a major hub in San Francisco had opened its lines to the NSA.
3) “We are facing a new theat and times change where we have to put the old ruls aside.” (paraphase)
The old laws were more than sufficient. The FISA courts were administered in secret, with all documentation kept a secret. The FISA courts rejected a miniscule number of executive requests for warrants in its 30+ years of existence. More than 99.9% were granted. If you don’t believe me please look it up for yourself.
Ultimately you believe we should put blind faith that the executive (Bush) will act in our national interest. I think, in light of all the evidence, recent and historical, it is our civic duty to be skeptical of government and to let our laws decide what is right, and not an all-powerful leader, whomever it may be.
@giggitygoo: “It is the government that should be ensuring legality, not private companies.”
I forgot to mention that it are the courts that ensure legality, not the executive branch. The JD is run under the executive – its head is a cabinet member. We have a system in place (judicial review) whereby Federal justices determine the legality of actions, no matter who committed them. Nobody should be above this standard, especially the President, who has the most potential to abuse power.
I find it odd that my comment about how this behavior isn’t that odd at wartime was deleted.
The Consumerist claims to only have a pro-Consumer bias, but that is clearly false
@JeffDrummer: It’s actually Barack Obama’s people, using the new powers of the Telecom Immunity Law, just a couple months ahead of time. Think of it as a test drive.
Let’s see how the Unitary Executive theory looks when a king of a different clan that yours sits on the throne, okay?
@Trai_Dep: I’m for a less powerful Executive…
And how does that change the fact that a differing POV was suppressed?
@JeffDrummer: My comments fail to post here a fair percentage of the time. I think a flaky web site is a lot more likely to to be the cause than deliberate censorship. Note that comments *appear* to post immediately, but that’s just the site faking it with AJAX. If you actually reload you’ll find they don’t appear for others until a minute or two later (when they appear at all.)
The problem with the idea that we should be willing to give these powers up “during wartime” is that the administration has defined this as a war that will never end.
@JeffDrummer: that was totally a joke. We’re not ideologically well-suited to Big Brotheresque delusions of kinghood and unitary control. We’re more cat-herders.
I’ve lost comments too, but ascribe it more to the nature of the interwebs, especially because the Gawker commentator features are constantly upgrading.
You’re not seriously thinking that some Consumerist gnome waits in the dark to delete posts they don’t ideologically agree with, are you? Why, that would leave them no time to find more Kitten pictures. Which simply. Would. Not. Stand.
The government has long been running monitoring over electronic transmissions for years. Just wikipedia ECHELON. UKUSA has had the effort up for longer than most people realize or even conceive.
The government passed this bill to protect telecoms from being sued by civilians for following the government’s instructions. This is nothing more (I believe) than the government being fair to the companies that built the very infrastructure that the government monitors.
The amazing thing about ECHELON is that there’s no need for taps anymore… and haven’t been for a very, very long time.
Local agencies need taps. The Feds “don’t.”
I have to add, which I should’ve written more about in my last comment, so I apologize for the double post.
People get so hung up about giving up privacy rights when this FISA bill came into public eye, but we’re forgetting what kind of privacy concerns we should be having in airports…
- nudie xrays
- laptops ruled by supreme court as searchable as luggage
And not to say “look how bad THEY have it” but in the UK, the freakin crossing guards carry staffs with cameras in them.
I am much more concerned about warrantless searches of laptops and xray-to-body imaging of _children_ in airports than complaining about monitoring that I’ve known about since 99. I just happened to read about it then.
@CaliCheeseSucks: Nathan Hale? WEE CHZ PWNS CALY CHZ.