Just the other day, I was despairing for our nation, its history, and most of all, its constitutional principles. I’d felt for many years that one commonality that the people of this country had was a deep abiding protectiveness of our constitution and the rights it espoused. But the last several years worried me to the point of fear– not fear of terrorists, not fear of foreign enemies, of fifth columns– but fear of ourselves. Despite FDR’s famous proclamation, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” I feared that the people of this country were willing to let a mighty nation sink into a morass from which it could not rescue itself.

I’m now cautiously hopeful that perhaps we haven’t reached that day yet– that just maybe we have leaders who understand, if only a little, what an extraordinary legacy our forefathers left us, and why it’s so important not to destroy it. On Wednesday, the House of Representatives did not cave in to Smirk and his corporate cronies by capitulating on the disingenuously named Protect America Act (PAA), which would have granted the telecoms immunity for their “alleged” cooperation in allowing our gummint to snoop on whoever they wanted monitor communications. Bear in mind that AT&T isn’t just about phone calls anymore; it’s also about internet service these days as well, which means it doesn’t matter whether you’re old or young, deaf or hearing, black or white– the gummint isn’t going to discriminate among different groups; it’s just going to cast a wide net, period.

Instead of following the Senate and just handing the White House whatever it wanted, the House rightly rejected the renewal of the PAA. The main bone of contention between the Senate and House bills is that the Senate more or less agreed that the telecoms and the executive branch could do whatever they pleased; the House, on the other hand, thinks that maybe people’s civil liberties should be preserved, and people who break the law (read: the telecoms) shouldn’t be given a free pass.

Smirk of course didn’t like being told that, so he cajoled and threatened all day Thursday and Friday, but the House left town without renewing the bill. Now we’re being told that we’re all in danger (funny how every time we’re being told to fear something or that we’re in danger, it’s when the administration is either potentially in lots of trouble or they didn’t get their way. Kind of how little kids act, really… anyone remember color-coded terror alerts? Does anyone know if we’re at “yellow” these days?), but when you think about it, it’s really a bluff.

For one thing, as I noted last month, the “patriotic” phone companies only let their patriotism go so far; once the bottom line was being threatened, they cut off gummint snooping until the bills were paid up. Guess they aren’t too worried about “imminent attacks,” are they?

Just in case you think this is all a bunch of hot air over nothing, let’s look at what Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) had to say about all this the other day:

Let’s not forget why we are even talking about this issue.  At some point in 2001, the Bush Administration began a massive program of warrantless spying.  New reports suggest that the Administration began its warrantless spying even before 9/11.  The Administration never told Congress what it was doing.  In clear violation of the FISA law and in complete disdain for the 4th Amendment, it also never told the FISA court what it was doing.

Because the Bush Administration secretly ignored the law, we still do not know how deeply this program invaded the privacy of millions of innocent Americans.  The push for immunity by this Administration is a push to avoid all accountability for a wiretapping program that was a massive violation of the law.

Gee, our gummint didn’t bother to tell Congress about what was going on? The Fourth Amendment too. Say, isn’t that the one about “unreasonable searches”…? Something about “warrants” and “probable cause” too. Isn’t that pesky?

Kennedy goes on to add:

Think about what we’ve been hearing from the White House in this debate.  The President has said that American lives will be sacrificed if Congress does not change FISA.  But he has also said that he will veto any FISA bill that does not grant retroactive immunity.  No immunity, no new FISA bill.  So if we take the President at his word, he is willing to let Americans die to protect the phone companies.  The President’s insistence on immunity as a precondition for any FISA reform is yet another example of his disrespect for honest dialogue and for the rule of law.

It’s painfully clear what the President’s request for retroactive immunity is really about.  It’s a self-serving attempt to avoid legal and political accountability and keep the American public in the dark about this whole shameful episode…

This is what it’s really all about. It’s about a president who’s broken the law, co-opted the telcoms to break the law along with him, and is now trying to cover his ass and the asses of the corporate hacks he pals around with.

As for FISA, it’s still in existence. Nothing has changed– we are not suddenly going to lose the ability to spy at all– it’s just that the executives who cared more about money are going to have to perhaps face the music instead of getting away scot-free for breaking federal laws.

That’s the real issue here, and Glenn Greenwald, in another great post, excerpts and highlights Michael McConnell’s (no, not a certain “pundit”!) admission of what it’s really all about: “However, that’s not the real issue. The issue is liability protection for the private sector.”

In other words, it’s all about Cover Your Ass (and your political donors’ asses).

Congressman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) also had quite a bit to add. His entire letter is worth reading, but I’ll just include this bit here:

The issue of telecom liability should be carefully considered based on a full review of the documents that your Administration withheld from Congress for eight months.  However, it is an insult to the intelligence of the American people to say that we will be vulnerable unless we grant immunity for actions that happened years ago.

“…a full review of the documents that your Administration withheld from Congress for eight months…” Hmm… whatever happened to cooperation between the different branches in our gummint? Sounds more like a power grab, increased unchecked power, and a blatant disregard for the laws of this nation, doesn’t it?

So I’m hoping that the new pair our Representatives seem to have grown aren’t just temporary ones, a “good for one day only” deal. I’m hoping that finally Congress will reassert itself and restore some semblance of balance, and finally demand some accountability. Yep, I’m cautiously hopeful…