It's obvious why Bush desperately wants to grant retroactive amnesty to lawbreaking telecom companies; he's trying to save his own skin once he leaves office. But figuring out his supporters' arguments is more confusing. Let's take a look at an article by Jeff Babbin on the Human Events website.
He starts off with an absurdity: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has been the sole obstacle to passing a bipartisan bill to modernize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act." Imagining that the House Speaker, in a Congress where the parties are almost exactly balanced, has the power to single-handedly stop a bill which Bush has been backing with all his resources, is bizarre. The implication that she is the sole source of Congressional opposition goes beyond bizarre.
Then we get the explanation: "Speaker Pelosi, in thrall to the trial lawyers, has done everything possible to kill the legislation." It's understandable that Bush would claim that the trial lawyer lobby is the principal source of opposition to immunity. As I said, he's desperate. But how is it possible for Babbin to believe that claim or to expect others to believe it? This seems to say that the trial lawyer lobby regards the telecom lawsuits as so lucrative that they've given Pelosi enough resources to make a majority of Congress stand up to Bush for no good reason, when they could easily buy any amount of favorable, broad-based legislation for much less.
It keeps getting sillier. "The FISA court orders which have enabled some intelligence gathering to continue despite the expiration of the earlier bill will themselves expire in August. At that point, Usama bin Laden can begin using pay phones." It's hard to tell where to begin. Yes, the government can still engage in "some" intelligence gathering -- as much as it wants, in fact, provided it follows legal procedures. As for the "pay phones" bit, I can't even guess what that means to ridicule it.
A little further, he declares that the legislation must be passed "before the August expiration of existing FISA court orders blinds our signals intelligence gatherers altogether." First, we might ask why the FISA Court won't renew those orders. The sunsetting of the so-called "Protect America Act" doesn't stop that. Second, we might ask what immunity for illegal surveillance has to do with renewing court orders.
I give up. I can only conclude that Human Events is targeted at idiots who make decisions based on rhetoric, not reasons, and that the publication is dedicated to supporting cronies, not principles. If this is what's left of the conservative movement, it's rotted more than I thought. (It's already dead.) But the article unintentionally warns of a danger: some House Republicans are trying to buy off the House with a "media shield" bill in exchange for telecom immunity. It's the old carrot-and-stick game.
Will the Democrats stand firm on principle? Sorry, that's a silly question. But I can hope that they realize how much they stand to lose in the coming election if they cave in to Bush's assault on justice.
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