Dear Harry Reid ...

Image credit: National Archives


Several bloggers and progressive political action committees have joined together to petition Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to honor Senator Chris Dodd's hold on the FISA modification bill now in committee. The issue, of course, is immunity for telecomm corporations that cooperated with the Bush Administration in violating the FISA law. The co-signers are:

American Civil Liberties Union
ColorofChange.org
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Moveon.org Political Action
Working Assets Wireless
Jane Hamsher, Firedoglake
Duncan Black, Eschaton
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, DailyKos
Christy Hardin-Smith, Firedoglake
Glenn Greenwald, Salon
Matt Stoller, OpenLeft
John Aravosis, Americablog
Chris Bowers, OpenLeft
Digby, Hullaballo
John Amato, Crooks and Liars
Howie Klein, DownWithTyranny
Taylor Marsh, TaylorMarsh.com

Our Open Letter to Harry Reid

All kidding aside, these are the top blogs in progressive politics.

They've asked the rest of us (that means bloggers and readers) to join with them in helping to preserve the constitutional protections we ought to be able to take for granted. Which ones? Why, these:

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

NARA: Bill Of Rights

The telephone system and the Internet, which are increasingly becoming one and the same, are the "papers" of our age. Our personal information, including bank records, medical histories, and other thing we'd just as soon not have in the hands of unscrupulous people, pass through these channels every day. Allowing the government and the telecomms to listen in at will is tantamount to having no privacy at all.

The immunity issue is a bit more complicated, but it boils down to this - if the telecomm executives who cooperated with the government are allowed to skate, then there is no reason for them to ever implicate the Bush Administration officials who enlisted them in this sad business. As I've mentioned before, that means that we'll never get to the bottom of what the Bush Administration did, and that means no one will pay for violating the law and our civil liberties. If the government can violate the law, we become a banana republic with above-average living conditions. If you don't believe that, quite frankly, you should have stayed awake in civics class. As the letter explains:

Providing amnesty to lawbreaking corporations is a complete assault on the rule of law and on the basic fairness of our political system. When ordinary American citizens are accused of breaking the law, they are forced to go to court and, if the accusations are proven, they suffer the consequences. If the telecoms really did nothing wrong, they should prove that in court, like all Americans must do.

Congress has faced up to this before. In 1965, some of our nation's largest banks were found by courts to have broken our anti- trust laws and also wanted amnesty from Congress for what they did. Senator Robert F. Kennedy spoke out forcefully against this. As The New York Times reported:

He objected to the basic philosophy of retroactive immunization which, he said, might logically be applied to 'murder or any other crime.'

The rule of law is the basic guarantee in our society that all Americans are treated equally. Amnesty for big business is an assault on that principle. To grant retroactive amnesty would be to announce that our wealthiest corporations are free to break the laws we pass, and amnesty would be yet another huge step in eroding our core political principles.

Tell Harry Reid: No Immunity for Lawbreaking Companies

So, please, sign the petition, follow the links in Taylor's article, and maybe call a Senator or two on this list and find out where they stand on this issue. Here's the electronic whip count as it stood when you loaded this page:



I'm usually reluctant to embed such things, because they inevitably have to be cleaned up afterward, but this time I'll make an exception. So I hope that if you're not the sort who normally signs online petitions, you'll make an exception here.

UPDATE: Been wondering why we haven't heard anything but warmed-over pap from the Clinton camp on this? Looks like Jane Hamsher has the answer to that one, not that I'm surprised:

Now everyone who has been soaking up all that telecom money, who needed that “war on terra” excuse for their vote, is in a bit of a bind. Is it a coincidence we haven’t heard anything convincing from Hillary Clinton, who took in $87,130 in telecom contributions in the 2006 cycle — more than anyone else currently in the Senate? That makes Jay Rockefeller’s contributions look like abject chicken feed.

Hillary Clinton, A Bundle of Telecom Money….And A Strange Silence

Hey, everyone has a price, but $84K? That will barely get her through a day in Iowa.

UPDATE (Oct. 27): As Taylor mentioned in the comments, she's one of the bloggers sponsoring the petition. I've added her name to the list.