Tug Of War Over Wiretapping
Classified Documents And Threatened Filibuster In Fight Over Immunity For Telecoms
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The debate over the Bush administration's controversial wiretapping program.
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However, the White House continued to draw a line between Senators and House members.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had demanded that other members of the panel have the same access to the same documents before he considers giving immunity to telecommunications companies that may have tapped Americans' telephones and computers without court approval. The measure is an amendment in the Senate's version of the bill rewriting the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (or FISA).
White House Counsel Fred Fielding had offered to let Chairman Patrick Leahy and ranking Republican Arlen Specter see documents that might persuade them to include liability protection for telephone companies, but initially only to them.
Later Thursday, the White House agreed to expand the documents' distribution.
"Fred Fielding's offer to Sens. Leahy and Specter extends to the other senators and staff they designate," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto, adding that any such lawmakers and staff would have to be given a classified briefing first.
"The chairman and the ranking member can work this out," Fratto added.
Leahy told reporters he expected to see the documents as early as Monday.
The committee's endorsement of the immunity plan is needed for the broader legislation to move forward. Some senators refuse to consider the matter without seeing the classified documents.
"Immunity suggests that there's been a violation of the law and they want to be absolved from any liability," Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., told reporters. "I would like to know what happened before I absolve anyone from liability."
The documents have so far not been made available to congressional counterparts on the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees.
The Senate bill would direct courts to dismiss lawsuits against telecommunications companies if the attorney general certified that a company gave assistance between Sept. 11, 2001, and Jan. 17, 2007, in response to a written request authorized by the president, in trying to detect or prevent an attack on the United States.
Suits also would be dismissed if the attorney general certified that a company named in a case provided no assistance to the government. The public record would not reflect which certification was given to the court.
Immunity suggests that there's been a violation of the law and they want to be absolved from any liability. I would like to know what happened before I absolve anyone from liability.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill."Let the courts decide whether these companies, or some of them, were acting patriotically, with nobility and legally, or whether they were breaking the law." Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said.
In noting the difference between the two bills, Fratto told The New York Times that the White House would continue to withhold those documents from House Committees unless the provision is added.
“If the committees say they have no interest in legislating on the issue of liability protection, we have no reason to accommodate them,” he was quoted.
A Hold On Immunity
But it may not even make it into the Senate version. After the immunity clause survived the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., announced that he would place a hold on the bill, effectively keeping it from coming to the floor.
"For six years this President has used scare tactics to prevent the Congress from reining in his abuse of authority," said Dodd today, denouncing the measure.
When Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid suggested he might push the bill to a vote anyway, several other Democrats (including Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Russ Feingold) announced that they would back a filibuster to keep the provision out.
Telecoms like AT&T are facing lawsuits claiming that they willingly participated in eavesdropping of U.S. citizen's communications, including phone calls, e-mails and Internet traffic, at the request of the government, without the government providing warrants, as required.
In one lawsuit, filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, AT&T is accused of allowing the National Security Agency to monitor its customers' private communications through special equipment installed in AT&T offices across the country.
This summer, National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell said that if the lawsuits were successful, "it would bankrupt these companies."
In a curious twist in the insider trading trial of Former Qwest Chief Executive Joe Nacchio, his defense introduced papers suggesting that Qwest's refusal to participate in the secret spying program cost the company government contracts.
After the program of warrantless wiretaps was revealed by The New York Times in December 2005, the White House promised to incorporate judicial oversight to its surveillance program (as had existed before September 11, 2001), while maintaining that the president's inherent authority allowed him to authorize warrantless eavesdropping. The push-pull over this authority led to the temporary Protect America Act, and the permanent version now being debated.
The current FISA program is set to expire in February. Under these rules, the government can monitor Americans' phone and computer lines outside the country if the attorney general certifies that the American is believed to be an agent of a foreign power. The new bill would require the government to get a court order to eavesdrop on Americans wherever they are in the world.
Mr. Bush emphasized that passage of a new FISA bill authorizing his eavesdropping program was vital to "staying a step ahead of the terrorists who want to attack us."
However, at the same time he suggested that passing a simple reauthorization the Protect America Act was not enough, by saying he would veto any bill which did not include immunity for the telecoms.
The government has refused to acknowledge what assistance the telecoms provided, and has invoked the "state secrets" privilege to prevent AT&T, Verizon and Qwest from either confirming or denying their participation in the program when requested by Congress.
Civil liberties advocates have strongly opposed the amnesty effort.
"Why is the president of the United States trying to get the telecommunications companies off the hook for their illegal activity?" said Caroline Frederickson, director of the Washington legislative office of the American Civil Liberties Union. "He is supposed to be upholding laws, not encouraging companies to break them."
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Well, number one, there should be no bill legalizing illegal activity by the President, so I hope it remains "entangled" and second, those telecoms may get immunity, but I have a list, and they won''t be getting my business. I have already cancelled my account with Verizon.
Running a Telecom implies the responsibility of knowing what the regulations are regarding wiretaps and eavesdropping on private conversations. We have laws that allow both and they are very liberal. All that is required is a court order and most judges - even the "libral" (sic) activists - will sign off on one, often without bothering to read the da*ned thing.
Using the excuse "The Government told me to do it" simply is not good enough. Even in the military it is appropriate to question (and even disobey) an illegal order. If more telecoms stood up to WH pressure and refused to participate in this illegal invasion of our privacy maybe GWB would have backed off. Or maybe not but then the telecom industry would have a stronger moral platform to stand on when the intestinal debris hits the fan as it appears to be doing now.
Hint to the Democrats....Sink this bill authorizing wiretaps and God knows what else. There are now enough of you in the Senate that it can die the ignominious (is that a word? It is now!) death it richly deserves.
I see mass lawsuits against the telecom industries,records are there,because administrations change,new people come in.
that were spying on Americans telephones. Looks like
I will be canceling my account with AT&T for illegally spying..... Hope more of you will be doing the same thing.
"Let the courts decide whether these companies, or some of them, were acting patriotically, with nobility and legally, or whether they were breaking the law." Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said.
In noting the difference between the two bills, Fratto told The New York Times that the White House would continue to withhold those documents from House Committees unless the provision is added."
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The NSA spying scandal is a major political crime of the Bush administration, and repeated efforts to beautify the FISA law will not change the fact Bush, Cheney and others broke the law not once, not only frequently, but as a matter of Bush policy for years.
We cannot afford a scofflaw in office who, in November, 2005, facing an assembly of party members critical of his NSA spying program, bristled like a teenager caught drinking after curfew-- "Stop throwing the Constitution in my face! It''s just a GD)((#@*! piece of paper!"
Is this figure, who claims to be president of the United States, the same who pledged an oath to "protect, preserve and defend" the document he calls a "GD)((#@*! piece of paper"?
Bush should be tried for crimes against humanity and breaking the laws and constitution of this country.
If they violate privacy, break the law, or in any manner infringe on the rights of individuals they should be prosecuted and/or held liable under the law of the land.
It matters not who encouraged them to do it. Especially not with this gang of crooks.
Being a lawyer you would say that more $$$ for you.
Neither telecoms nor the white house deserve immunity in this. They both broke the law period. If Bush wanted to change the law he could have when he had his rubber stamp Republican Congress. He chose instead to break the law.
I the not-too-distant past, such behavior by a president of the United States would have led to immediate impeachment and removal from office. Unfortunately, the Bushies came to power through unscrupulous means, they maintain power through lies and intimidation, and they have no interest in upholding any laws. They only care about advancing the neocon agenda of world conquest, regardless of whether or not there is any world worth having when they are through with their campaign of terror.
With a suffienct level of inspection, I could find hundreds of ways to lock you up right now. And if, by some unbelievable stroke of luck, you have not managed to violate even one of the hundreds of thousands of laws of this country (most of which you will never know exist), then SOMETHING you have said or written will be construed to make it look like you are a dangerous enemy of the United States, an "enemy combatant", and you will be whisked away in the night by a squad of cia goons, sent off to a foreign land, and imprisoned and tortured until you die.
It doesn''t take much. Bush has ALREADY assumed the powers of a king, violating the Constitution of the United States of America. Our Founding Fathers would roll over in their graves if they knew what Bush and Cheney have done to destroy their dream of a democratic republic.
Anyone who still supports Bush, at this late stage of the destruction of our Democracy by the neo-fascist necons, deserves whatever evil that befalls them. The rest of us would like this country to return to being the "land of the free and the home of the brave".
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
They do not need or deserve immunity.
Companies have well paid and fully competent legal advisers and cannot ever be allowed to claim ignorance of the law.
"Immunity suggests that there''s been a violation of the law and they want to be absolved from any liability," Sen. *** Durbin, D-Ill., told reporters. "I would like to know what happened before I absolve anyone from liability."
The documents have so far not been made available to congressional counterparts on the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees.
The Senate bill would direct courts to dismiss lawsuits against telecommunications companies if the attorney general certified that a company gave assistance between Sept. 11, 2001, and Jan. 17, 2007, in response to a written request authorized by the president, in trying to detect or prevent an attack on the United States.
Suits also would be dismissed if the attorney general certified that a company named in a case provided no assistance to the government. The public record would not reflect which certification was given to the court.
so our laws mean NOTHING to anyone that works in the GOVERNEMNT. if they dont have to follow laws then NO AMERICANS HAS TO...THIS WILL BE A BIG MISTAKE TO HAPPEN IF CONGRESS LETS THIS GET INTO LAW....
Exactly that would be called a CRIME Senator, investigate and refer for indictment and prosecution, forget the Presidents demand, it has every appearance that he has ordered a High Crime and has a motive to remove the threat a prosecutor will need to leverage to gain the truth, immunity for the Telcoms would throw sand in the umpires eyes again obstructing another suspected criminal act by this Administration. There is no inherent or implied power in the Constitution that has endowed the President with power to spy on Americans and he is not above the law for the same reason. More suspiciously he the President did this secretly sneakily behind Congresses and the Peoples back during an election year and I want proof that campaigns and candidates where not spied on or the outcome of any election subverted, Congress at the Presidents request revised FISA on 4 occasions he had no reason to hide this from America unless it was a crime against us. This Administration does not have the trust of the public.
Find your plums Senator Durbin fight for the People, who have placed you in office,
Congress has not seen fit to do their duty and take action against obvious violations of the law.
Now those in Congress who have been most complicit in fostering and enabling illegal acts seek to absolve those outside of government who carried them out of any wrongdoing.
The rule of law is dead.
Only priviledge protects us now.
Posted by reaper221
They did not break the law. Sorry. You are really very misinformed.
Posted by trillion1
Why don''t you take a class as to what is actually in the Constitution? Wiretapping is not illegal. Article II Section I, for instance.
Posted by pepperp1
Hey, peepee, did the passengers on the crazy Iman behavior flight commit a crime too?
"Why don''''t you take a class as to what is actually in the Constitution? Wiretapping is not illegal. Article II Section I, for instance.
Posted by mudrose at 10:16 AM : Oct 29, 2007"
Really ???
"The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice-President chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows:[%u2026]"
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articleii.html#section1
Where do you see something about wiretapping in there ?
You must have been confused with ...
Amendment IV
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.
What does the 4th Amendment have to do with wiretaping?
The AUMF empowered the President to "use all necessary and appropriate force" against "nations, organizations, or persons" that he determines "planned, authorized, committed, or aided" in the September 11, 2001, al Qaeda terrorist attacks. The President''s war powers, even during this "war on terrorism" or "war on Islamic fundamentalism" or "Global War on Terror," have traditionally trumped limiting statutes.
Rubbish.
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by usaprophet
October 29, 2007 7:10 PM PDT
- What''s Ron''s message? Whatever you think Dr. Paul''s campaign is about, the main thing it has done thus far is to serve as a clearinghouse for voters like me who feel unrepresented by New World Order Fasciscts (mainstream Republicans) and their Socialist comrades in crime (mainstream Democrats). They''re actually one and the same. There is no real difference between the two parties. Most people, though, are too distracted, dumbed-down, or outright brainwashed by mainstream media, which endlessly regurgitates scientifically-crafted streams of information and entertainment aimed at imprisoning your mind and keeping your eyes closed to the realities of the world around you, to recognize this. Those currently in power, and those being groomed to take [major] political power, are the global elite, and we are their "plebs." People on the right and those on the left have many differences, maybe irreconcilable ones. But they have a lot of common beliefs too, and their numbers and anger are of a considerable magnitude. No matter what happens in 2008, I personally believe Ron Paul will influence the national conversation about what the role of the federal government is, how much power should government have over our lives, how much liberty we should give up for security. These are important issues, and frankly, no one''s talking about them as seriously and sincerely as Ron Paul. What''s for sure is that his growing army of supporters like me will be a force to be reckoned with in 2008.
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