Telecom Amnesty And The Protect America Act

   Just to show you how deeply entrenched the Bush administration is with the telecom industry and why amnesty should not be included in the FISA bill.

    Last fall, former attorney general John D. Ashcroft signed a letter to top members of the Senate Judiciary Committee urging retroactive immunity for the companies. His consulting firm, the Ashcroft Group, was on retainer to AT&T at the time. An Ashcroft spokeswoman declined comment.  Washington Post

  Why does that comes as no surprise? On further note:

Perhaps most important, disclosures in the lawsuits could clarify the scope of the government's surveillance and establish whether, as the plaintiffs allege, it involved the massive interception of purely domestic communications with the help of the nation's largest providers: AT&T, Cingular Wireless, BellSouth, Sprint and MCI/Verizon. (Verizon Communications bought MCI in 2006.)

"I think the administration would be very loath for folks to realize that ordinary people were being surveilled," said Kurt Opsahl, senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which filed the lead lawsuit, against AT&T.    WaPo

  Do you and I really need to hear any more? Hell yes we do!

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