Politics: FISA

Grrr. That miserable ass-kissing creep, Steny Hoyer, has rolled over on the telco immunity for the FISA bill. McJoan at DailyKos has the agonizing details.

If you have any interest in knowing just how much the telcos spied on you, and what the government did with this information, please do as McJoan says and call these telephone numbers:

Call Barack Obama and urge him to make a public statement reiterating his opposition to telco amnesty. His opposition could kill this deal: Phone (202) 224-2854, Fax (202) 228-4260

Call Steny Hoyer and tell him this is a bad deal: Phone (202) 225-4131, Fax (202) 225-4300

Call Nancy Pelosi and urge her to pull the bill from the House schedule: Phone (202) 225-4965, Fax (202) 225-8259

Call your representative and tell them to vote no on the FISA rewrite tomorrow.

McJoan has the telephone numbers of the Blue Dog Dems who voted for this bill, and those who had the courage to vote for the better version. If you value your right to be free of intrusive Government surveillance, please go to the link and do as McJoan asks.

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Update: Well, poo. We wuz wrong about DiFi. It looks as if she voted against the telco immunity. Sorry about that, folks. Leapin' Stupids Disease appears to be out of remission. Apologies, Senator Feinstein. We still disagree with you more than half the time on your votes, but we were wrong on this one. We'll take our medicine like a cat: snarling, hissing, running away, and hiding (oh, wotthehell, Archy, a few scratchings for good measure).

Over at his Soapbox, Ted sounds as if he's set to become an adoptive parent to a high-needs child. Congrats, Ted.

Casa de Los Gatos believes in adoption, as opposed to reproduction. With 6.x BILLION FUCKING PEOPLE (and we do mean fucking people, or we wouldn't be up to 6.x billion) on the planet, there is absolutely no need for more "mini-me's," y'awl. Whatever your particular genetic signature, chances are it's already out there in teh pool. In fact, the gene pool could stand a hearty dose of chlorine.

Adopting children, on the other hand &mdash that's a mitzvah. Those tykes &mdash especially the high-needs kids &mdash they could use your help. Consider the life of a child in the foster-care system, which is where unwanted children go in the U.S. of A, and you will agree that abortion ought to be a sacrament. No one should have the right to throw another sentient creature away, like these children are thrown away. Abandoned, unwanted, bullied, beaten, they are ground through the system and on their 18th birthday, kicked out with little more than the clothes on their backs. And then it's life on the streets, drugs, prostitution, petty crime, and back into the system, except this time it's the jail and prison end. Anybody who sincerely believes this is better than a quick suction job is deluded or insane or both, and desperately in need of a retroactive abortion themselves.

Ted, you're a mensch. I hope things work out with the kid, and for you overall.

Over in Wyandotte, Michigan (eww, cold!), a group of very courageous people are meeting weekly to protest the disgusting war of occupation in Iraq. They blog about it at Wyan.blog, which Casa de Los Gatos discovered thanks to the efforts of Lizzy, who lives with 922 cats (and kittens!). You can see them standing out there all bundled up against the cold, bravely holding their signs every week. Kudos, Wyans. We wish we could be there with you in the flesh, but our flesh is, regrettably, falling off our damaged bones these days. We're with you in spirit, though.

We have not blogged the Senate's criminal position on the telco immunity aspect of the FISA bill because we knew everyone else would do it and do it better and require fewer psychoactive meds. And sure enough, Batocchio over at Vagabond Scholar puts the boot in nicely and tells us what to do next.

Is Dianne Feinscum your Senator? Find out who's running against her, throw your support to the candidate most likely to beat her overprivileged ass to pulp, and flood her office daily with calls, faxes, email, letters, and postcards. Casa de Los Gatos should not need to warn you to maintain a civil and respectful tone regardless of your current state of mind, whether utter hopelessness or despair.

Here's the list of Democratic Senatescum who voted to give the telcos retroactive immunity, thereby insulating them forever from the consequences of breaking the law and crapping all over the Constitution:

• Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)
• Evan Bayh (D-IA)
• Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
• Tim Johnson (D-SD)
• Herb Kohl (D-WI)
• Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
• Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Mark Pryor (D-AR)
• Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)
• Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)
• Ken Salazar (D-CO)
• Tom Carper (D-DE)
• Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
• Jim Webb (D-VA)
• Ben Nelson (D-NE)
• Bill Nelson (D-FL)
• Kent Conrad (D-ND)
• Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)

You can safely assume that the majority of Rethuglican Senatescum voted to grant immunity.

A significant number of those on the preceding list are "Blue Dog" Democrats, that is to say, scumsucking pigs willing to give their constituents and principle the rigid digit if they think they'll get a little lobbyist money out of it. But La Casa de Los Gatos once had great respect for Claire McCaskill and Jim Webb, and thought Barbara Mikulski was on the side of the people. Folks, please write to your legiscum - our democracy only works if we all participate, whether by writing letters or making phone calls or visiting these people and talking to them. Please make an effort, do your part, get them to hear that two out of every three people in this country do not want retroactive immunity for the telcos.

This has been your daily roundup of B.A.D. bloggers. Casa de Los Gatos thanks you for your attention.

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Politics: FISA and You

Do you ever wonder if the telcos handed your phone records and other information to which they might have had access, to the spy agencies? Sure, you do. You and most other Americans probably have a low-level stress alert set on FISA, because we know damned well those bastards have been spying on all of us since March of 2001. For the date- or history-impaired, that would be six months before the incidents of 11th September.

The FISA votes have been wending their constipated way through the Legislature for years now. A little movement here, a little squeeze there, while we all sit and fume and wonder what the fuckers are up to now.

AP tells us that the Chimperor is determined that telcos will have immunity for their illegal acts in aiding spying on American citizens. One way he's doing this is to order his rage of hunchmen (yes, Frank Zappa coined that phrase) to do everything they can to delay the so-called "stimulus" package in return for FISA concessions. This will make it look as though the Democrats in the Legislature are failing to give money to the suffering masses.

First off, the chutzpah of this boondoggle just fucking blows our socks off here at La Casa de Los Gatos. Even the gatos' tiny white socks have been blasted to various corners of the universe by this unholy level of total fucking cheek.

What they're trying to do, the Republican legislators and the Chimpidiots, is ensure that you can never find out whether you were spied on. No, really. If these telco pigs get their proposed "immunity," you can't force them to disclose whether they handed your records to anybody. They're immune from prosecution.

This also means you can't find out whether any other shenanigans were going on - you know, like, did the Misadministration funnel millions in taxpayer money to the telcos specifically for acts that violate the FISA laws or the constitution? Did they encourage violation of the constitution by, say, tapping the phones of attorneys talking to clients (that is ANY attorney talking to ANY client, like, oh, your divorce lawyer, or your spouse's patent lawyer; your bankruptcy lawyer - lots of potential for ugly right here).

Did they hand over for future use to intelligence agencies damaging information gleaned from illegal surveillance - like, were you, an elected official, bopping your boyfriend on the taxpayers' time? Or were you, a person with hopes of running for office someday, exchanging incriminating communications with your homo-, bi-, or generally queer-sexual partner or fling? Or a Young Republican engaging in sexual shenanigans of which your church, family, community, and state would thoroughly disapprove?


If Darth and Idiot Boy get telco immunity, you're screwed - we're all screwed. We won't be able to find out what they've got on us, when they started collecting it, what laws they violated - we probably won't even be able to get them to stop, or to turn over the information (not that that would do much good. That which has been seen cannot be unseen).

Already, our slimy AG, Michael Mucousy, has sent a letter to Harry Reid warning of the proposed veto.

In ten days' time the current FISA law will expire. Thus, the Republicans and the Misadministration are going all-out to ensure that the version that passes will protect their good buddies at the telcos, and, incidentally, screw the people. We're only good for paying taxes and working and spending to keep the economy going so these crooks and liars can spend our money making themselves and their friends rich.

If not for Senator Chris Dodd, we'd already be screwed.

So hie thee over to McJoan's excellent post on who you need to call and what you need to tell them. Because if you don't pressure your whiny sad-assed legislators to protect you, you better start purchasing lube by the gallon.

Oh, you might want to send these to your legislator. They've long since proved they haven't got any.

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Politics: FISA and Retroactive Immunity

Okay, we're not going to give Harry Reid much-deserved hell for failing to support Senator Chris Dodd's principled stand on the FISA bill and retroactive immunity for the telcos who assisted the Bush crooks and liars in illegally spying on the American people. At least the little creep is finally standing up on his hind legs and listening to Chris Dodd and the two out of three Americans who want the telcos to face up to their crimes and shenanigans.

Lookit, folks, these telcos are the same scumballs who cut the FBI off for failure to pay timely - not failure to pay at all, just failure to send the next whopping check on time. So they don't really give a sideways flying shit if terrorists show up tomorrow and bomb us all to smithereens. All they care about is (a) making money, and (b) NOT paying for their criminal acts. So why exactly would we want to give them immunity?

At any rate, the Senate will soon begin voting on the retroactive immunity issue, so if you have a moment to spare, call your congresscritter and make sure that they stand with Senator Dodd and the 60+ per cent of us who think if the telcos want to make big profits off the American taxpayer, they'd better be answerable to that same irate taxpayer.

Whatta buncha schmucks.

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Politics: FISA Passes, No Immunity

Wow. How much good news can I take before my head explodes? I'm a little under the weather today, so maybe this will keep me from getting sick before a long plane journey.

At any rate, Raw Story tells us that the House of Representatives passed the FISA bill requiring judicial oversight (yay! No more warrantless wiretaps! We hope.) and told the telcos that they've squeezed enough out of the ratepayers to afford their own goddamned lawyers. Yes!

On a 224-192 vote, largely along party lines, the House adopted its proposal to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The measure, known as the RESTORE Act, would replace a temporary FISA update approved in August.

The bill does not include a provision to grant legal immunity to telecommunications companies that the Bush administration has demanded and it restores the role of the FISA court in approving surveillance methods used by the National Security Agency that could ensnare Americans.

In other news, the Senate is debating the bill currently, and their bill does grant immunity to the telcos, grrr. The only Senator who seems to ever stand up for the people, Russ Feingold, is planning to strip the telcos' immunity, but I'm sure Dianne "Brought My Own Lube, George" FeinSTAIN and Joe "Should I Bend Over And Spread 'Em Now, George?" LIEberwhore will fight tooth and nail to ensure that the people's rights get trampled in the rush to give the telcos whatever they fucking want. God I hate those two losers.

The vote was entirely along party lines, and man, am I glad we put more Democrats into office in 2006! Just looking back at the preceding six years and the plethora of civil rights abuses, corruption, scandal, rubberstamping - EESH!

Raw Story is working on the story right now, so pop by to toss them some dosh and catch the latest details.

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Roll Call Vote on FISA

You can go here if you want to see if your senator or representative was spineless.

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