Well we’ve all heard by now that the Senate passed - by a vote of 69 to 28 - the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, an unconstitutional domestic spying bill that pretty clearly violates the Fourth Amendment.
And it also, by the way, grants retroactive immunity to phone companies that illegally released confidential phone records to the government, helping it engage in warrantless wiretapping over the last seven years.
Before the final vote, the Senate rejected an amendment from Senators Chris Dodd, Russ Feingold and Patrick Leahy, to strip out the telecom immunity. That effort failed by a vote of 32-66.
Lest we forget the kind of lobbying and PR money behind all of this. See here, for example.
Lawsuits, of course, would have been the only real way for the facts about this entire illegal mess to come to light.
Here’s Law Professor Jonathan Turley talking to Rachel Maddow on Countdown last night, summing the whole thing up.
Comments