As Expected, Republicans Push To Get Telcos Off The Hook For Illegal Activities
from the who-woulda-thunk-it dept
Back in February, we broke the story that some Republican Congressional Representatives were looking to circulate a discharge petition to force a vote on the FISA bill that would grant telcos retroactive immunity for any illegal activity having to do with wiretap activities. And, in fact, that's exactly what happened. Earlier this week, a group of Republicans started circulating just such a petition. This is an extremely rare move. A discharge petition hasn't been used successfully since 2002. However, the reasoning behind the supporters of this discharge petition is highly suspect and deserves to be examined. Rep. Roy Blunt stated:"More than 66 days have passed since House Democrats allowed a key piece of terrorist surveillance legislation to expire--not because they had concerns with the bill, but because they were seemingly more concerned that not enough trial lawyers would be able to file enough expensive and frivolous lawsuits against U.S. telecom firms."That's both incorrect and misleading at the same time. First of all, there were concerns with the bill: the concerns about giving telcos immunity for potentially illegal activities. As we've pointed out, there are really only three potential reasons for wanting immunity, and they certainly have nothing to do with filing frivolous lawsuits. If this was about frivolous lawsuits, immunity wouldn't be needed -- because the cases would get thrown out. The only real reason to push for immunity is because it's known that the telcos and/or the administration acted illegally. In such a case, immunity obviously shouldn't be allowed. No one has yet given a decent reason for immunity, and the statement here to back up the discharge petition is incredibly disingenuous. Hopefully, a majority of Congressional representatives will realize that and reject the petition.
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Filed Under: congress, immunity, telcos, wiretapping
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Keep rotting America
Doubtful. But its no big deal, its just that the dream of a brave few is dead and rotting. Not like it was a good dream either.
Freedom. Pfft. Who needs it?
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Telco Immunity?
Someone(s) wants to leave the Telcos "unprotected" for complying with Federal Government requests to "tap wires" or "eavesdrop" on wireless conversations in an attempt to stop the bad guys from killing a whole bunch of us again? Izzat right?
I guess I just don't get why the Telcos (who are private enterprises, and among the most highly regulated by our governments) should be held liable for something with which they MUST comply.
And, I don't understand why we think the bad guys should be able to use any means they can find to kill more of us, but we should "fight back" with both our hands and feet tied behind us, and beans in our ears.
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Burma
Humans are one of the few animals that crap where they sleep. Seems we haven't changed much since emerging from caves.
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Re: Telco Immunity?
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Anonymous Coward
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Misleading
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Re: Telco Immunity?
Now, if you don't have a court order...that's breaking (multiple) federal laws, violating separation of powers, etc.
It's a straw man argument to say that the Democrats don't want to wiretap terrorists. They just want the executive to follow the law (you know, that whole oath with "uphold the law" whereby one is sworn in as President). It is not required to break the law when wiretapping terrorists.
Also, it's a blatant lie to say that the Dems want trial lawyers to make money. The primary case, Hepting vs. ATT, is being represented by EFF lawyers, who are non-profit.
It's also a blatant lie to say that they need expanded eavesdropping powers to listen in on terrorists. They don't; FISA does not cover foreign-to-foreign calls, and never did. You can even listen in on a call into or out of America, so long as "minimization procedures" are followed and the American end of the conversation isn't saved. All without a warrant.
In fact, there is some controversy over this recently, because Mukasey spoke to Congress and gave a teary-eyed speech blaming FISA for their inability to stop 9/11. Congressman Conyers wrote him a letter calling him on it, and then the DOJ started blaming an Executive Order for the problem with listening in on 9/11 plotters.
Basically, they're just using the OMGTERROR defense. It worked on Iraq...thankfully it's not yet working on telco immunity.
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Finally, someone with an objective grasp on things.
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The Senate counterpart to the bill now before the House was passed by the cognizant Senate committe on a vote of 13 to 2 for consideration by the full Senate. Once on the Senate floor it was passed by a vote of 68 to 29. The bill approved by the Senate includes the Teleco immunization provision.
What it seems is going on in the House is a political battle between some members of the Dem party and a coalition of other Dems and Repubs attempting to have the bill brought to a vote. The petition mentioned in the article is intended to force a vote on the bill, which likewise contains the conferral of Teleco immunity.
It is pretty easy to see why the Telecos are concerned. Some of them are already embroiled in lawsuits initiated by the EFF and the ACLU. The legislation would truncate those lawsuits. It seems to me it is one thing to be ticked off at the Executive Branch, but quite another to try and draw the Telecos into what is clearly an issue between the Executive and Legislative Branches.
Despite constitutional overtones, this is certainly a power struggle between the House and the Executive, with the House trying to use the Telecos to obtain some measure of political advantage.
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And anyone who thinks we can stop terrorists by turning the US into a police state has no understanding of history or of current world affairs. So that's a specious argument.
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The reason is simple
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Re: Telco Immunity?
No, actually. That's wrong. What they're concerned about is leaving the telcos unprotected for complying with *illegal* requests that did not go through the proper channels with the legally required oversight.
If the issue was just "an attempt to stop the bad guys from killing a whole bunch of us again" then they could have used the legal channels to require that.
I guess I just don't get why the Telcos (who are private enterprises, and among the most highly regulated by our governments) should be held liable for something with which they MUST comply.
That's the thing. They didn't need to comply with these requests, because they did not come through the proper channels. There are perfectly workable channels for such requests. If they were not used, then the telcos have every right to push back.
And, I don't understand why we think the bad guys should be able to use any means they can find to kill more of us, but we should "fight back" with both our hands and feet tied behind us, and beans in our ears.
If you don't understand why there should be due process and oversight in how the gov't spies on American citizens, then you have a funny understanding of America and what it means to be free.
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Don't the Democrats
If you have specific examples where specific Republicans are causing problems, why don't you tell us? I'm betting you're (At least) ignoring the fact that it's more than just Republicans causing the "problem", and you don't say anything about it because it doesn't fit your screed. Typical.
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Re: Don't the Democrats
Hence the discharge petition...
If you have specific examples where specific Republicans are causing problems, why don't you tell us?
I thought I did. It's a group of Republicans (no Democrats) pushing the petition, one of whom I named in the post, and I quoted him blaming the Democrats... Which part did I leave out?
I'm betting you're (At least) ignoring the fact that it's more than just Republicans causing the "problem", and you don't say anything about it because it doesn't fit your screed. Typical.
What "screed" am I trying to fit? If you think this site is pro-Democrat, then you clearly haven't read it for very long. It's neither pro-Democrat nor pro-Republican. I tend to dislike both parties equally.
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Re: Telco Immunity?
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Re: Re: Telco Immunity?
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Article 1; Section 9; Paragraph 3; "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."
Case closed.
Nothing for a thinking individual free of greed, self serving interests, and hidden agendas to even consider... oops...
That leaves out the president, congress, and every other politician in the land.
Governmental corruption and attempts to undermine the Constitution were one of the primary reasons our forefathers thought to include the Second Amendment.
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How would you feel if a federal officer walked into your bank and said "Give me all the money in GrandDad's account" and the bank manager gave him every last cent of your money. No warrant, no court order, he just told the manager to give it to him and the manager did. Would you want the bank held accountable for illegally giving away your money?
Having the telcos help the government spy on ordinary people and then not being held accountable for it, sure sounds like a step toward a police state to me.
The problem is that Bush is under the impression that the president makes the laws simply by giving orders.
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Don't show political bias
This is a general item where both parties are guilty -- and members of each have taken some pretty questionable positions.
(and no, I am not a republican -- I am non-affiliated).
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Re: Telco Immunity?
Because they are terrorists and we are not. Because they break all the rules and do whatever it takes to gain their objective, and we stand for right-reasoned civilization. Because they aim for destruction and suffering and our aim is to serve and protect our citizens. We don't fight by their rules because we are not them.
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Yay
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Re: Keep rotting America
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Re: Re: Telco Immunity?
Just because some one broke into your car and stole you CD player doesn't mean that you should break into someone else's car and steal there CD player.
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We should...
I think most of our problems with this country (of which I love dearly) are because of too much government involvement. Give it back to the people.
Start with our God given rights and take everything else away.
(I do understand that you have to keep criminal laws for violence and such, so save those posts calling me an idiot)
Why do you think the forefathers of this country started the revoulution? Mostly, too much government involvement in their lives (just over different circumstances).
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4th Amendment
The gov already has a rubber stamp warrant program, so there is no justification for the warrant-less taps.
And stop with the "bad guys""terrorists""bogeyman" nonsense. Those are the risks you accept living in a free society. And frankly the threat is less then significant, it is instead used a means to extract more funding and curb civil rights.
BTW, @Grand Dad shouldn't you be in a ward or something.
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Telco Immunity
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Re: Telco Immunity
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Re: Telco Immunity
The rules for handing over data to the government are quite clear and extremely explicit. If the telcos refused because the gov't did not follow the rules, then they would not risk prosecution. They would merely be pointing out that the government needed to follow the rules.
In fact, Qwest was one telco that did note these requests were illegal, and it did not face prosecution from the government. All it did was ask the gov't to follow the stated rules.
What's wrong with that?
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Telco immunity
should be monitored . It may help the congress remember what they supported 10 min ago.
PS: I hope that they leave the doors to their homes open like that have to our county.
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