Changes to Foreign Intelligence Sureveillance Act of 1978

The Democratic takeover of Congress last year became known as “The Wave” amongst political types here in DC and elsewhere. The passage of S. 1927, which gave Alberto Gonzeles the legal authority to spy on American citizens without a warrant, may become infamously known as “The Cave”.

Democrats caved on this one big time. The original purpose of this bill was to correct a supposed defect in the original Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act which was preventing the government from spying on foreigners who routed their communications through the US. Regardless of how you may feel about this, by itself it is a minor issue, as Congress is constantly tinkering with intelligence issues such as this one. But combined in a bill, packaged by Republicans, with a clause to expand the reach of the original Act to include warrantless surveillance of communications between foreigners and Americans, and you have an amazingly transparent violation of the 4th Amendment.

How did this happen? Well, for starters, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid screwed us. He struck a deal with Republicans to bring the bill to the floor. Nobody knows what the terms of the deal are, but there was most certainly a deal in place before bringing it to the floor, as illustrated by the 60  yes votes in the Senate (just enough to prevent a filibuster), and the fact that 6 Democrats (and 12 Senators total) did not vote at all. So rare is it that 12 Senators would skip a vote on a bill, that no more than 7 have missed a vote on the same bill since 2003, when 8 Senators did not vote on a bill that was to be decided unanimously (in other words, its fate was not in doubt).

This gave conservative Democrats the ok to vote in favor of the bill, and just like that the 4th Amendment was defaced. Their rationale? Well, the official line is that they wanted to protect Americans from terrorists, of course. The “inside baseball” angle on this, however, is that they didn’t want to give Republicans the ability to label them as soft on terrorism during the summer break. Never underestimate the Democratic tendency to fear Republican labels more than the ire of their base, much less show concern over the threat a bill like this poses to the essential freedoms the Bill of Rights was designed to protect.

Among the Democrats who voted for this bill is our very own Diane Feinstein. While that surprises few, I was surprised to see that Barbara Boxer was one of those who did not vote. I guess her travel plans were a little more important than defending the constitution. Bummer. At least we had one representative who voted against this horrible bill. Unfortunately she’s the same person who allowed it to come to a vote before the House.

So lets spread the love a little:

Senator Feinstein: webmail, (415) 393-0707

Senator Boxer webmail, (415) 403-0100

Speaker Pelosi, webmail, (415) 556-4862

by ARN