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As Usual, Becky has the best analysis of telecom amnesty....

... and those of us in Delaware can again hang our heads in shame at Tom Carper's craven vote.

Becky, that Girl in Short Shorts, lays out the best simple (but not simple-minded) analysis not only of what telecom amnesty means, but just how much of a travesty it is to portray the Democratically-controlled Congress as opposing the Bush administration on anything significant.

Junior has also unequivocally stated he will veto any version which does not give amnesty to the telecommunications companies, who participated in his illegal spying program. He won't even accept a 21 day stop gap extension of the current law, to keep us safe until the House can act on this.. Its all or nothing, and its all about priorities. It seems protecting the pocketbooks of giant telecommunication companies is more important than dead Americans.

So yesterday the Senate gave our president the greatest gift all. They retroactively rendered crimes committed by Bush’s illegal spying program totally cool and stopped any chance of a judicial ruling about the program's legality—putting a halt to all the pending lawsuits, which have not been going all the great for the telecoms.

Back in the 1970's America kicked Nixon out on his ass for much less. But today, even though the Senate has become quite concerned about Bill Belichick's videotaping of defensive signals ,we embrace lawlessness and our elected leaders thwart all efforts to investigate it. And the media and nation cares much more about a baseball player who might have used roids or HGH.


Crap like this is why I continue to maintain (a) that a McCain-Clinton presidential contest means that all of us lose, because it simply places yet another political insider in charge, and nothing substantive will ever change; and that (b) there isn't that much different between Delaware and the US Congress--when it comes down going along to get along, there isn't much to choose from.

This also gives credence to what many Libertarians see as one of the most appalling hypocrisies of American politics: that the so-called differences between right and left or liberal and conservative are less useful than the distinction between statists and libertarians.

This Telecom vote means that not only is the State right in destroying your privacy, but IT WAS ALSO RIGHT to do it WHEN IT WAS ILLEGAL.

Up next: retroactive amnesty for CIA operatives who engaged in water boarding when it was illegal, too.

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