Civil Liberties -- Falling Short In Spying Safeguards

June 23, 2008

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Ali Frick, and Benjamin Armbruster

CIVIL LIBERTIES

Falling Short In Spying Safeguards

On Friday, the House passed "the most significant revision of surveillance law in 30 years," and the Senate is expected to soon follow suit. House leaders insisted the bill was a "compromise" with conservatives, but as the New York Times noted, it was actually "a major victory for the White House after months of dispute." While progressives succeeded in forcing the White House to accept some important concessions, the deal fails to give the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court the authority to protect law-abiding Americans from being spied on by their government. It also essentially shields telecoms from civil lawsuits for their participation in the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program after 9/11 and almost certainly ensures that the approximately 40 lawsuits that have been filed against telecoms for complying with the administration's illegal spying will be dismissed.

RESTRICTIONS ON 'CIRCUMVENTING THE LAW': The bill is not without its positive features, including prior court review in most cases of the government's procedures for selecting surveillance targets, "a prohibition on 'reverse targeting' of Americans, and a new requirement of probable cause for surveillance of Americans abroad." It also contains an important affirmation stating that the intelligence restrictions are the "exclusive" means by which the president can conduct surveillance, which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said would prevent Bush and future presidents "from circumventing the law." Despite these provisions, the bill -- set to expire in 2012 unless Congress renews it -- is, overall, a "major disappointment" according to Center for American Progress Senior Fellow Mark Agrast. It significantly expands the government's powers to spy on terrorism suspects and "would strengthen the ability of intelligence officials to eavesdrop on foreign targets. It would also allow them to conduct emergency wiretaps without court orders on American targets for a week if it is determined that important national security information would otherwise be lost."

IMMUNITY FOR LAWBREAKING: The most controversial aspect of the new bill is the immunity it provides for telecomms. Under this bill, a federal district court would be responsible for reviewing "certifications from the attorney general saying the telecommunications companies received presidential orders telling them wiretaps were needed to detect or prevent a terrorist attack. If the paperwork is in order, the judge would dismiss the lawsuit." This process appears to be nothing more than a formality; House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) predicted that all the lawsuits "will be dismissed." Sen. Christopher Bond (R-MO) speculated that "the White House got a better deal than even they had hoped to get." Agrast also noted that the legislation still fails to restore the role of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court. "Now, instead of determining whether probable cause exists for the issuance of a surveillance order, [it] will be reduced to reviewing the adequacy of the surveillance procedures established by the Bush administration."

SEPARATE SENATE IMMUNITY VOTE?: The Senate will likely pass the House's legislation since it already approved immunity for telecoms last February. At the time, House leaders "offered to extend temporarily the other provisions of the eavesdropping law, the Protect America Act, while the immunity issues were debated." The deal, however, was rejected by conservatives and led to the current "compromise" bill. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) last week told Bloomberg TV that he will "try to have a separate vote on immunity" when the legislation comes before his chamber. "Probably we can't take that out of the bill, but I'm going to try," he said. This debate will also focus the spotlight on the two presidential contenders. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) has indicated that he plans to vote for the bill, but added that he opposes telecom immunity and "will work in the Senate to remove this provision so that we can seek full accountability for past offenses." Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) also plans to vote for the bill, but has made no apologies about providing immunity. The McCain campaign has explained that "companies who assist the government in good faith should not be punished." He voted for the Senate's immunity bill in February. McCain has also attempted to give the Bush administration a pass on its warrantless National Security Agency surveillance program, exposed in December 2005. "It's ambiguous as to whether the president acted within his authority of not," he claimed, directly contradicting the August 2006 ruling of U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, which declared the program unconstitutional.

INTENSIVE LOBBYING CAMPAIGN: The White House was clearly pleased with the House's bill, since officials had worked for months to obtain telecom immunity. On Friday, President Bush called it a "good bill." Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell even allowed the Bush administration to put him in the "unusual role of intelligence community lobbyist" in order to pass this legislation; traditionally, intelligence chiefs have been expected to "remain insulated from policy issues." Throughout this process, there has been little compromise or cooperation by White House officials, who worked closely with the telecom industry. Not surprisingly, the Bush administration refused to publicly release "internal e-mails, letters and notes showing contacts with major telecommunications companies over how to persuade Congress to back a controversial surveillance bill." According to CQ, telecoms and their business allies spent more than "$14 million lobbying in just the first three months of this year."

ETHICS -- WHITE HOUSE TO ARGUE IT IS IMMUNE TO SUBPOENAS: Today, the refusal Bush administration's to honor House Judiciary Committee subpoenas compelling White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former White House Counsel Harriet Miers to testify, will be considered today in federal court. The committee is seeking information into the 2006 dismissal of nine U.S. attorneys, but the White House claims that executive privilege allows the White House to ignore subpoenas, asserting that the executive branch has "absolute immunity" to congressional subpoenas. The House will argue that the Bush administration "is seeking to expand presidential power in a dramatic fashion, one that cannot go unchallenged by Congress." An array of "former U.S. attorneys, watchdog groups, congressional experts, and current and former lawmakers" have filed briefs supporting the House's position. The lawsuit came after Attorney General Michael Mukasey ordered the Department of Justice to ignore the House's contempt citations. Oral arguments today come just two days after Bush again asserted executive privilege, this time in refusing to hand over documents related to an investigation into whether the administration has "pressured the Environmental Protection Agency to weaken decisions on smog and greenhouse."

IRAN -- MULLEN: I WANT 'A HEALTHY DIALOGUE WITH IRAN': Last month, President Bush launched a political attack against Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) and other Democrats while speaking before the Israeli parliament, saying that they favor a policy of appeasement toward terrorists. "Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals," said Bush. "We have an obligation to call this what it is -- the false comfort of appeasement." After Bush made the comments, CNN's Ed Henry reported that "White House aides" said that Bush was referring to those who have said that "it would be okay for the U.S. President to meet with leaders like the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad." But now, Bush's chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Michael Mullen, appears to be siding with those who favor direct engagement with Iran. In an interview with National Journal published this weekend, Mullen spoke favorably of directly engaging with Iran. "I would like to have a healthy dialogue with Iran," said Mullen. "I do think engagement would offer an opportunity, certainly, to understand each other better." Mullen isn't the only administration official who has eschewed Bush's absolutist rhetoric in favor of a more diplomatic approach. The day before Bush made his "appeasement" remarks, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a group of retired diplomats that we need to "figure out a way to develop some leverage" with Iran "and then sit down and talk with them." Gates later refused to defend Bush's attack.

AFGHANISTAN -- VIOLENCE ESCALATES AS TURMOIL CONTINUES TO ENGULF NATION: After several days of fierce fighting in eastern Afghanistan and along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, Gen. Egon Ramms, a German NATO general, is advocating the deployment of 6,000 additional soldiers as both U.S. and NATO commanders are acknowledging that the Taliban is "resurgent in the region." Gen. Dan McNeill, who commanded NATO's International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan for 16 months, said during a Defense Department briefing recently that attacks in eastern Afghanistan increased by 50 percent in April from the same time last year. Further, comprehensive data released by the NATO-led command show a steady escalation in violence since NATO took charge of the Afghanistan mission in 2006. In May, for the first time, American and NATO combat deaths in Afghanistan outnumbered the toll in Iraq. After fire-fights in Farah Province, which left two American soldiers dead last Thursday, the Defense Department is reporting that there have been 451 U.S. deaths in the Afghanistan region since 2001. While coverage of the war in Afghanistan has increased slightly this year, CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan noted that no American television network has a full-time correspondent in Afghanistan. "If I were to watch the news that you hear here in the United States, I would just blow my brains out because it would drive me nuts," Logan said.

"Five years into the war in Iraq and nearly seven years into the war in Afghanistan, getting news of the conflicts onto television is harder than ever." Almost halfway into 2008, the three evening network newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007. "That's about two minutes of Iraq coverage, per network, per week."

More than four years after it began broadcasting, the Arab television station Al-Hurra -- the centerpiece of a U.S. government campaign to spread democracy in the Middle East -- "is widely regarded as a flop in the Arab world, where it has struggled to attract viewers and overcome skepticism about its mission."

Dr. James Hansen, who warned Congress 20 years ago today that human-induced global warming had begun, will "call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.

The Army and Air Force discharged a disproportionate number of women in 2007 due to "don't ask, don't tell," according to statistics obtained by the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. While women make up just 14 percent of Army personnel and 20 percent of Air Force, they accounted for 46 percent of those discharged by the Army last year and 49 percent of those discharged by the Air Force.

It will cost more than $8 billion to replace or renovate the security around the most vulnerable U.S. embassies abroad, according to State Department documents. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the Bush administration has spent $4.1 billion in embassy renovations, but "at least 150 American missions abroad fall short of" necessary security standards.

And finally: Counterculture comedian George Carlin died yesterday of heart failure at the age of 71. Carlin, who began his comedy career in the 1950s, was recently named the recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. Watch a clip of one of his famous routines.

"Americans gave to charities last year at about the same rate they did the previous year, holding steady on their donations in the face of a housing-market meltdown and a crisis in credit."

NEW YORK: Gov. David Paterson (D) reaches an agreement with legislators on extending health benefits to 9/11 first responders.

PENNSYLVANIA: Institutions around Philadelphia are holding a "Year of Evolution," with exhibitions, seminars, and lectures to celebrate Charles Darwin's 200th birthday next February.

MASSACHUSETTS: "Governor Deval Patrick will unveil more than 50 recommendations this week that seek to dramatically change the way education is delivered and funded in Massachusetts."

THINK PROGRESS: Washington Post ombudsman criticizes David Broder and Bob Woodward's buckraking.

WONK ROOM: Congress continues to fund Bush's failed abstinence-only programs.

THE CRYPT: Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson vow to press on with their lawsuit.

"[A]t least 30 of those prisoners hitherto released from Guantanamo Bay have returned to the battlefield."
-- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, 6/12/08

VERSUS

"Justice Scalia's claim of 30 recidivist detainees is belied by all reliable data."
-- Seton Hall University report, 6/16/08

Think Progress

Falling Short In Spying Safeguards

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