FISA: Bush Signs, ACLU Sues

Yesterday Dubya signed away another piece of democracy when he gleefully scratched his name in blood onto the FISA bill.

George W. Bush Thursday signed a law expanding legal authority for wiretaps by spy agencies which he hailed as vital for America's security, after a fierce Congress battle. "This law will play a critical role in helping to prevent another attack on our soil," Bush said as he signed the bill, calling it "vital to the security of our people."

"The bill will allow our intelligence professionals to quickly and effectively monitor the communications of terrorists abroad while respecting the liberties of Americans here at home," he said. The law includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications firms which aided warrantless government surveillance operations following the September 11 attacks in 2001, meeting a key White House demand.

The ACLU responded with an immediate lawsuit.

"Spying on Americans without warrants or judicial approval is an abuse of government power - and that's exactly what this law allows. The ACLU will not sit by and let this evisceration of the Fourth Amendment go unchallenged," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. "Electronic surveillance must be conducted in a constitutional manner that affords the greatest possible protection for individual privacy and free speech rights. The new wiretapping law fails to provide fundamental safeguards that the Constitution unambiguously requires."

In today's legal challenge, the ACLU argues that the new spying law violates Americans' rights to free speech and privacy under the First and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution. The new law permits the government to conduct intrusive surveillance without ever telling a court who it intends to spy on, what phone lines and email addresses it intends to monitor, where its surveillance targets are located, why it's conducting the surveillance or whether it suspects any party to the communication of wrongdoing.

Accomplished: 3351 Dead Soldiers

Today is the anniverary of one of the stupidest and most contrived political stunts in American history and the Democratic candidates are not missing the opportunity to comment on it.

Barack Obama: "Four years after President Bush landed on an aircraft carrier and declared ‘Mission Accomplished,’ we are still in a war where more than one hundred American service members have died in just the month of April. We grieve for them today and urge the President to avoid making another tragic mistake by signing the bill that will end this war and bring our troops home."

Hillary Clinton: "Never before in our history has a President said ‘mission accomplished’ when the mission had barely begun. Never before has a President landed on the deck of an aircraft carrier to proclaim the end of major combat operations to a war that rages on four years later. Never before has a President pulled a political stunt when so many American lives were and remain in harm’s way."

John Edwards: "Four years ago, President Bush flew onto the deck of the U.S.S. Lincoln under a ‘Mission Accomplished’ banner to declare victory in Iraq, but all the photo ops in the world can’t hide the truth – his disastrous mismanagement of the war has left our troops in harm’s way and made Iraq a breeding ground for terrorists."

As of yesterday, the death toll for American soldiers in Iraq is at 3351. The number of wounded and maimed is over 24,000. The toll for Iraqis is literally immeasurable. And tomorrow the president will likely veto the bill to set a timetable for withdrawal.

I am ashamed to be an American.
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