Thank you for writing regarding the Bush Administration's request for legislation that would provide immunity for telecommunications companies that are alleged to have provided assistance to the National Security Agency after September 11, 2001. I appreciate your thoughts on this topic, and welcome the opportunity to respond.



On February 12, 2008, the Senate passed legislation to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA). I voted against that legislation.



During the Senate's debate, I introduced an amendment on the Senate floor that would limit the grant of immunity. Under my amendment, cases against the telecommunications companies would go to the FISA Court for judicial review. The companies would only receive immunity if the FISA Court found that the alleged assistance was not provided, that assistance met legal requirements, or that a company had a good faith, reasonable belief that assistance was legal.



I believe this approach strikes the correct balance: it maintains court review and a judicial determination of whether companies provided assistance that they should have known violated the law.



I also offered an amendment to restore FISA's exclusivity, to ensure that no surveillance program can proceed outside the law in the way that the Terrorist Surveillance Program did for more than five years. Unfortunately, neither amendment was adopted.



The House and Senate are now trying to reach agreement on a bill that all parties can support. I strongly hope that the negotiations will provide an alternative to full telecom immunity and include strong language on the exclusivity of FISA, as I believe it is important to have judicial review of this very important issue.



Again, thank you for writing. I hope that you will continue to write on matters of importance to you. Best regards.

Sincerely yours,
Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator

Further information about my position on issues of concern to California and the Nation are available at my website http://feinstein.senate.gov/public/. You can also receive electronic e-mail updates by subscribing to my e-mail list at http://feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.c...erSignup.Signup.

DiFi, you couldn't be more wrong.
Wrong on Mukasey.
Wrong on Impeachment.
Wrong on Telecom Immunity
Wrong on Justice Roberts, Alito
Wrong to award no-bid contracts for your husband's profit.
Wrong in your choice of neck jewelry.
Wrong
Wrong
Wrong.
Step down old woman, you're out of touch with your own country.

The California Courage Campaign sent me a questionairre asking me where they should focus their efforts.
I said, let's RECALL DIANNE FEINSTEIN and cited most of the above reasons, sans the poor taste in necklaces.
Let's get rid of Nancy Pelosi this November, then we'll work on ousting DiFi.
Can't stand two of my three representatives!!! Barbara Boxer is almost always fantastic!

She has a LONG history of being a VERY conservative "Democrat."

I saw a documentary about Harvey Milk.

She was on the board of city (San Francisco) supervisors with Harvey Milk when that whole thing happened in 1978 and from what I remember she was not very supportive of Harvey, and was actually a supporter of Dan White (the guy that murdered Milk and Mayor Moscone).

To give DiFi credit, when all that happened, she pulled this city back together as mayor, and as far as I know, she was a pretty good mayor.
I didn't live here at the time, but I've heard she was a pretty decent mayor, too bad she couldn't be a more decent senator. Power corrupts.

Point taken... I really have no idea about that.

Be on the lookout for the new Harvey Milk movie that just finished filming here in SF a few months ago.
They really went all out on authenticity and remaking the Castro to look like the 70's.

I came home to the Bay Area in 78 and worked in SF all through the 80's and early 90's. I remember Jonestown and worked with Van Odell, one of the few survivors. I also remember her politics as always conservative for SF. But I always gave DiFi her props for both being on the scene sticking her fingers in Harvey's wounds attempting to stop his bleeding and really healing the city as Mayor in the aftermath. It IS sad to see her now. she reminds me of the Claude Rain's character in Mr. Smith goes To Washington.

I didn't live in SF, but I was in the Bay Area when Milk was killed. I remember hearing Feinstein's voice live on the radio at the press conference announcing his death. She managed -- barely -- to get through it without breaking down. And I agree she did well to pull the city back together again.

Here's a report on YouTube from NBC on the deaths of Milk and Moscone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUB-RCNBDnk
Feinstein's press conference is included. As you can see, it was a pretty tumultuous day.

San Francisco is such an amazing city!

The first time I went wasn't that long ago... The day Columbia was lost.

As a gay kid growing up in the conservative suburbs of Dallas, San Francisco was the promised-land.

Now I really and truely understand the line "I left my heart in San Francisco."

Folks have this view of SF being this progressive hippie-free-love-in place. It ain't. It's a conservative business town that is simply socially liberal. It's probably the only issue I sort of disagree with the Goddess about. (Shock!) She says it's the amazing weather that makes the politicians so flip floppity. It's not. It's big business.

There's a huge chunk of the defense industry there, research, high tech, shipping, pharma, import/export, etc. It's the most east coast of West Coast cities in that regard. So it's no surprise that some of their representation in the House and Senate would have strong conservative leanings on many, many issues. Unfortunately, things probably won't change in California until we get clean money elections happening.

And actually, the weather isn't that great in SF. It rains a lot and can be foggy, soggy and humid.

I guess 30 years later, she has finally decided to drink the Kool Aid

So let me get this straight: Her "answer" was to have the telecom's immunity be reviewed/approved by the very secret court that keeps approving these illegal invasions of American's 4th Amendment privacy rights??????

How is it any better for a secret rubber-stamp court to "review" this, than for a rubber-stamp Congress to???

The ANSWER, Ms. Feinstein, is to scrap this anti-American bullshit entirely, and start living up to our fucking VALUES as Americans, you wench.

God, I want her gone.

I will vote for literally ANY true Liberal who runs against her. I don't give a shit what party they're in -- Democrat, Green, Socialist..... WHATEVER.

Just get somebody in there who understands the liberal values that founded this country.