Another day, another article pointing towards Democratic capitulation on FISA. The Washington Post reports:

Some aides on Capitol Hill were discussing the potential for the House passing the Senate version but breaking it into two votes: one on the portion of the bill that deals with revising FISA provisions and a second on the immunity measure.

This procedural move would allow many Democrats to vote against immunity but still make its approval all but certain since almost every Republican and some centrist Democrats would vote in favor.

I’d hope no one in the Democratic caucus is counting on people who’ve fought long and hard against retroactive immunity to be fooled by a “no” vote on a free standing retroactive immunity measure. The existence of such a vote would be indication enough that the Democrats in Congress failed to defend the rule of law, despite over six months of promises that they would oppose Bush and Cheney on immunity.

Kagro X describes the “compromise” well:

It’s not the White House compromising on the substance of the bill with Congress. It’s the Congress compromising with itself on the procedure by which they’ll hand the White House exactly the substance it demands. One vote or two? It’s your choice! See? Compromise!

The failure of Democrats in the House, at this point presumably the Democratic leadership that is seeking a compromise, to recognize the line in the sand they were supposed to not cross is truly astonishing. You would think that by having watched the Senate Democrats get divided and rolled into voting on and passing the Rockefeller-Bush-Cheney Intel Committee bill that included little oversight and retroactive immunity, the House leadership would know what doesn’t work in this legislative process. Remarkably, like Harry Reid before them, the House leadership is preparing to set a legislative agenda that guarantees that retroactive immunity will pass and executive authority to conduct surveillance of the American public without congressional or judicial oversight will have been expanded.

I’m squarely with Digby on how I will be thinking about the Democrats who are helping the Constitution continue to be shredded by the Bush administration.

The Democrats believe they can fool the stupid rubes they represent by saying they aren’t culpable in this debacle because they voted against it! Yea! And we’re so stupid we’ll absolve them because we won’t figure out that the whole thing was rigged.

Digby also hits on a point that I was making earlier today, namely that regardless of what is likely to happen in the next administration, expansive executive powers to spy on the citizenry should always be opposed.

But this was a principle worth fighting for no matter what. No president, Democrat or Republican, should be trusted with this kind of power. And even if you believe that no wonderful Democratic Prez could ever be so bad, what if John McCain wins? Does anyone seriously think he won’t use it?

It seems that political expedience is winning out over principle in the halls of Congress.

It’s important that the Post article is continuing to rely on aides as sources for a yet-to-be-finalized “compromise.” No deal is final, even if the trend is bad. That means we need to continue to put pressure on our representatives in Congress to oppose retroactive immunity and any “compromise” that sets the table for retroactive immunity to pass. Contact your Representative through CREDO Action and tell them to oppose retroactive immunity.

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Cross posted at the CREDO Action Blog.