The Coming FISA Fight

There was talk in the past couple weeks of an extension of the Protect America Act beyond the length of President Bush's term. I considered keeping that terrible law versus enacting a new one with telecom amnesty to be a Hobson's choice. And it looks like we're going to have to fight just to get that choice.

Given what I'm hearing from D.C., it looks like we may have this battle on our hands the middle of next week. I'm told the year-long extension will only come into play if 1) Dodd and his allies can clog up the works again, or 2) if they do pass a bill with retroactive immunity, but are then unable to agree with House negotiators in conference committee.

Reid should just throw the towel in right now and go for the extension. It's beyond me why he'd want to waste time on this, and hopefully he doesn't.

This was Bush's number one priority (which should tell you something), and he's ramping up the fear machine through his spokesman Tony Fratto:

“We’re exactly three weeks away,” he said, “from the date when terrorists can be free to make phone calls without fear of being surveilled by U.S. intelligence agencies”.

Actually, we're many weeks past that point, since the US government had a bunch of their wiretaps cut because they forgot to pay the bill. By the way, the companies that cancelled those wiretaps are the same ones we're supposed to give amnesty for being patriots.

Unfortunately, the President would rather protect the phone companies than protect civil liberties. There's either going to be a bill with amnesty or an extension of a bad bill. Given that awful choice, I'll take the extension, because we have to know why and how our government spied on US citizens. Meanwhile, I have total confidence that Chris Dodd will continue to do everything he can to stop this insane bill from passing. And he'll do it at his own peril.

Democrats said the FISA fight - which could come in the first week or two of the new session - may be an early test of whether Dodd's presidential campaign has caused any significant strains in his relationships with colleagues.

One senior Democratic aide said that while some Democrats could have been irked in the heat of the moment, most understand it is the nature of presidential campaigning for candidates to tackle hot-button issues and to rely heavily on veteran staff for day-to-day work in the Senate.

"I think it's too early to say" whether there are any hard feelings, the Democratic aide said. "But I think you could term it as a key few months for him" in terms of his reintegration into the Caucus. "It will be interesting to watch when he returns," the aide said.

Sen. Dodd needs to know that we have his back. At the moment the best way to do that is to help him retire his debt from his Presidential campaign. And when he sounds the bell to help him in the FISA fight, we need to be there too.

UPDATE: Sen. Feingold is absolutely right. It would not be a "win" to keep the Protect America Act in place. That is a horrible law. Congress should let it expire and make a slight patch to allow surveillance on foreigners communicating with each other overseas, even if the switcher goes through the US. Anything else should go through the FISA court as it has for 30 years.