Political Bloviation

Bush Warns House on Surveillance - New York Times
With the House moving toward a vote on electronic surveillance legislation that the White House has said falls far short of its requirements, President Bush warned legislators strongly Thursday morning against passing what he called “a partisan bill that will undermine American security.”

There is no issue affecting our ability to listen to terrorists. The real issue is the telecom immunity provision that would prevent the public from knowing the extent to which the Bush administration broke the law.

Here’s another gem:

“House leaders simply adopted the position that class-action trial lawyers are taking in the multibillion law suits they have filed” against the phone companies, he said. This “would undermine the private sector’s willingness to cooperate with the intelligence community, cooperation that is essential to protecting our country from harm.”

The lawyers helping the EFF in this case are working pro bono. And we don’t need “willingness to cooperate” with lawful court orders, they’re not optional. He must be talking about willingness to once again break the law. There’s no need to shield the telecoms, they already have immunity for acting in good faith to comply with a government request. The only people it protects are the policy makers who asked the telecoms to break the law in the first place. It’s not telecom immunity were talking about here, it’s Bush immunity.

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