Glenn Greenwald has more on Senator Feinstein’s “Good Faith” Amendment and why it’s both unnecessary and itself offered in bad faith:

Telecoms already have immunity under existing FISA law. As long as they acted in good faith, they are already immune from liability. There is no reason that the federal courts presiding over these cases can’t simply make that determiniation, as they do in countless other cases involving classified information.

Even Feinstein’s “compromise” is a completely unnecessary gift to telecoms: to transfer the cases away from the federal judges who have ruled against them to the secret FISA court. But even that pro-telecom proposal is unacceptable to Rockefeller (and the administration), because that would still leave telecoms subject to the rule of law. Rockefeller’s only goal is to bestow on his telecom supporters full and unconditional protection from having their conduct — and, by effect, the administration’s conduct — subject to a court of law. Manifestly, that’s the real agenda.

Greenwald also highlights a passage in an article in Politico that show’s that Feinstein’s amendment does not pass muster with the architect of retroactive immunity, Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia.

Rockefeller also rejected a potential compromise being floated by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) that would let a secret FISA court decide whether the telecom companies, who are being sued for going along with official requests from the Bush administration to cooperate with warrantless surveillance programs, acted properly.

Going beyond Feinstein’s “good faith” Amendment, Greenwald addresses the false arguments Rockefeller is making to defend his friends, the big telecom companies.

If telecoms were really these poor, “helpless” victims unable to defend themselves, the solution isn’t to bar anyone from suing them even when they break the law. The solution, if that were really the concern, is simply to add a provision to FISA enabling them to submit that evidence in secret, the way classified evidence is submitted to federal courts all the time. The reality is that 50 USC 1806(f) already says exactly that, but even if didn’t, Congress could just amend it to do so.

Rockefeller’s claims also entail the core dishonesty among amnesty advocates. He implies that the real party that engaged in wrongdoing was the President, not telecoms, yet his bill does nothing to enable plaintiffs to overcome the numerous obstacles the administration has used to block themselves from being held accountable. If Rockefeller were being truthful about his belief that it’s the administration that should be held accountable here, then his bill would at least provide mechanisms for ensuring that can happen. It doesn’t, and thus results in nothing other than total immunity for all lawbreakers who committed felonies by spying on Americans for years without warrants.

Two of Jay Rockefeller’s top four contributors in the 2008 cycle are AT&T (#1 with $37,600) and Verizon (#4 with $30,500). Is it any surprise that he’s going to such great lengths to protect them from scrutiny for their potentially illegal behavior with their American customers’ private records and conversations?

The debate is going on right now. You can watch on CSPAN 2 or online here.

CREDO Action members have lead in the fight to stop retroactive immunity and warrantless wiretapping. Today may be the last chance to make our voices heard. Take action now and contact the Senate.

Also, check out FireDogLake, Brilliant at Breakfast, Lead or Get Out of the Way, and DailyKos for more reading material and action items.

Cross posted at the CREDO Blog.

Disclosure: I have joined the CREDO Mobile team to stop the Bush administration’s illegal wiretapping program and hold the telecom companies accountable for their lawbreaking.

The Senate is set to resuming debating warrantless wiretapping reform legislation this morning at 9:30 AM Eastern.

The first vote will likely be on the Leahy Amendment, which is a conversion of the Senate Judiciary Committee bill, which has very good minimization standards and stops blanket warrants. The Leahy Amendment also includes no retroactive immunity for the big telecoms that helped the Bush administration spy on Americans. Sadly, the Leahy Amendment is expected to fail.

Other amendments will be offered. The notable ones will be the Dodd/Feingold Amendment, which would strip retroactive immunity from the underlying bill (the Intelligence Committee bill). We expect this amendment to only get about 20 votes.

The Specter Amendment would substitute the federal government as the defendant in the cases against the big telecoms; the cases would otherwise be allowed to proceed but any liability would be paid by the US taxpayers. This amendment will probably lose.

The Feinstein “good faith” Amendment would move the cases against the big telecoms out of the regular judicial system and into secret intelligence courts. Robert Cruickshank of Courage Campaign continues to do great work analyzing Feinstein’s amendment. He’s updated the post I linked to last night with looking at the procedure laid out in Feinstein’s “good faith” amendment and comes to this conclusion:

…”good faith” would be sufficient for FISA to grant immunity.As described above, we already knew that this amendment was unacceptable because it gave a secret court, which the public has no ability to access, the power to determine whether our basic legal rights will be upheld. Now we learn that under Feinstein’s amendment it will be very easy for the FISA court, which virtually never turns down a government wiretap request, to grant telecom immunity. The telecoms will have every reason to claim they acted in good faith, and we know that the Bush Administration will back them up. This amendment is a recipe for immunity through the back door – or more accurately, through a secret court.

It’s my understanding that the Feinstein “good faith” Amendment has a chance of passing, though it would not have the support of some of the most liberal members of the Senate.

At some point, when the course of the legislation seems clear, the expectation is that Senator Chris Dodd will filibuster the bill, in the hopes of stopping retroactive immunity. He won’t have to do this if the Leahy or Dodd/Feingold amendments pass, but they are not expected to.

I’ll keep you posted with updates – the debate is starting shortly. For now, please contact your Senators and ask them to oppose retroactive immunity and stop warrantless wiretapping.

Cross posted at the CREDO Blog.

Disclosure: I have joined the CREDO Mobile team to stop the Bush administration’s illegal wiretapping program and hold the telecom companies accountable for their lawbreaking.

Martin at Scholars & Rogues has a great post up on what’s happening in the FISA debate and how people can get involved. It’s made even better by calling me a “mastermind.”*

I’m going to go sit in an overstuffed black leather chair while stroking my white cat and gazing at my wall-sized map of the world.

*He actually wrote “But as Matt Browner-Hamlin (who’s masterminding the CREDO campaign) points out…”, but I’m not comfortable taking that much credit for myself and prefer the noun over the verb.