Whistleblower: FISA ‘compromise’ advances police state agenda
By Nick Langewis | Uncategorized | Sunday, 29 June 2008
Retired AT&T engineer Mark Klein has condemned the Senate’s Wednesday cloture vote on the FISA Amendments Act of 2008.
The bill, if passed by final vote planned for July 8, would revise the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to retroactively grant immunity to customers’ civil lawsuits against telecommunications companies who participated in the National Security Administration’s warrantless wiretapping program, on the condition that they can provide documentation that they were told ahead of time that their activities were legal.
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"On the condition that they can provide documentation that they were told ahead of time that their activities were legal."
“[Wednesday]’s vote by Congress effectively gives retroactive immunity to the telecom companies and endorses an all-powerful president,” Klein said. “It’s a Congressional coup against the Constitution.”
continued...
In other words, all those who have broken the law, WALKS. And anyone trying to fight the criminals in court cases will be ignored.
CALL YOUR SENATOR, NOW!
Full Version: Whistleblower: FISA ‘compromise’
Obama Will Break Our Hearts -- But Progressives Need to Walk and Chew Gum at the Same
Miles Mogulescu
Posted June 29, 2008 | 08:44 PM (EST)
huffingtonpost.com
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When Barack Obama was on The Daily Show recently, Jon Stewart ended the program with the question, "I wonder when he'll break our hearts?" The answer should not come as a surprise to any mature progressive -- soon. With Obama's announced intention to vote for the FISA bill which will legalize much of George Bush's illegal wiretapping policies, our hearts may be broken even sooner than expected. It is particularly disappointing because Obama's FISA retreat is not just a tactical maneuver but a seeming compromise on fundamental constitutional principals -- that under the 4th Amendment, the executive should not be able to wiretap American citizens without an individualized judicial warrant. Moreover, Obama's rightward shift on FISA and several other issues may not even represent good political strategy. Instead, it may have handed Republicans the argument that Obama does not represent a new kind of politics but that he is, instead, an old-style politician with no enduring principles who will do and say anything to get elected -- a talking point that is being repeated by every McCain surrogate with a microphone the past few days.
Progressives should not give Obama an easy pass on his FISA turnaround. We must continue to stand for the 4th Amendment protections against warrantless wiretapping, criticize Obama's turnaround, challenge the constitutionality of the FISA legislation in court, and if Obama is elected, continue to build a movement to pressure Obama and a Democratic Congress to amend the FISA act to restore Constitutional protections.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogule..._b_109865.html#
Miles Mogulescu
Posted June 29, 2008 | 08:44 PM (EST)
huffingtonpost.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When Barack Obama was on The Daily Show recently, Jon Stewart ended the program with the question, "I wonder when he'll break our hearts?" The answer should not come as a surprise to any mature progressive -- soon. With Obama's announced intention to vote for the FISA bill which will legalize much of George Bush's illegal wiretapping policies, our hearts may be broken even sooner than expected. It is particularly disappointing because Obama's FISA retreat is not just a tactical maneuver but a seeming compromise on fundamental constitutional principals -- that under the 4th Amendment, the executive should not be able to wiretap American citizens without an individualized judicial warrant. Moreover, Obama's rightward shift on FISA and several other issues may not even represent good political strategy. Instead, it may have handed Republicans the argument that Obama does not represent a new kind of politics but that he is, instead, an old-style politician with no enduring principles who will do and say anything to get elected -- a talking point that is being repeated by every McCain surrogate with a microphone the past few days.
Progressives should not give Obama an easy pass on his FISA turnaround. We must continue to stand for the 4th Amendment protections against warrantless wiretapping, criticize Obama's turnaround, challenge the constitutionality of the FISA legislation in court, and if Obama is elected, continue to build a movement to pressure Obama and a Democratic Congress to amend the FISA act to restore Constitutional protections.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogule..._b_109865.html#
QUOTE (Morgan @ Jun 30 2008, 09:54 AM) 
[. . .]
"On the condition that they can provide documentation that they were told ahead of time that their activities were legal."
[. . .]
"On the condition that they can provide documentation that they were told ahead of time that their activities were legal."
[. . .]
These telephone companies are billion dollar corporations. They retain their own highly competent legal staffs so there is no possibility that they were not fully aware of the unConstitutional nature of their conspiratorial actions. In spite of what King Georgie happens to believe, the President cannot arbitrarily supersede the Bill of Rights and it's as simple a legal question as that.
Obama voted to pass this bill with the immunity provision intact, which was his first action that I strongly disapprove of. So my hope is if the bill does pass the Senate and the TelCos are immunized against civil litigation the Obama Justice Department will lodge criminal charges against the TelCo executives who conspired with Bush.
The charge should be Conspiracy to violate the Fourth Amendment, which is easily worth at least ten years in Leavenworth.
To anyone who thinks a President Obama won't abuse this power he's voting to give himself...I've got a bridge in Brooklyn, NY for sale. 
LOL...they call sheep, "Online Liberation Movement".
AT&T billing site makes jokes about company's participation in warrantless wiretapping?
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