FISA Email

Update
How authoritarians thinks:
"Of all the creepy post-9/11 phrases to which we've been subjected ("The Patriot Act" - "Protecting the Homeland" - "enhanced interrogation techniques" - "Department of Homeland Security"), I think the creepiest and most Orwellian is the phrase "good patriotic corporate citizen," used to describe companies which broke our laws because the President told them to. It's now apparently a Patriotic Duty to obey the President even if he tells you to violate the law.

The accompanying claim that companies should never "second-guess" the "judgment of the President regarding what's legal" -- which I just heard from John Cornyn and Saxby Chambliss -- is equally creepy, and is the crux of the authoritarian case for telecom immunity."

via Glenn Greenwald


Received this email this morning:

"Dear Michael,

Today there will be a showdown in the Senate over FISA legislation. Thanks to your phonecalls and emails, both Senator Obama and Senator Clinton will be there to vote "no" on cloture for the bill that would give retroactive immunity to Dick Cheney and the telecoms.

Glenn Greenwald gives the background here:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/01/28/bush_fisa/index.html

Please join us today at firedoglake.com as we liveblog the action in the Senate (which you can also watch on CSPAN-2), followed by the State of the Union Address.

Jane Hamsher"