Telco sellout immunity deal reached

Supposedly, Congressional negotiators and the White House have reached a deal on a new FISA bill that purportedly will send individual telco cases to courts to decide, but …

Will have those courts making immunity decisions with a stacked deck:

Under the possible accord, a federal court could immunize a company by ruling it had been given written assurances that its participation in the U.S. government's warrantless domestic spying program was legal and authorized by President George W. Bush, one source said.

This is a SELLOUT, as the ACLU already recognizes:

“This is a terrible deal,” said Caroline Fredrickson of the American Civil Liberties Union. “It’s just a quick way to dismiss the cases. They (phone companies) just have to show that the president told them to break the law.”

And, you know that, if Bush said nothing specific at the time, he’ll give them an ex post facto get out of lawsuits free card.

Basically, this is like the Kit Bond proposal from this spring, except with district trial courts deciding the immunity issue rather than the FISA court.

Well, we’ll see if Barack Obama is a real progressive by whether or not he filibusters this bill, should it get to the Senate.

Question: Will Silvestre Reyes, et al step up to claim paternity for this bastard bill, or will they slouch toward Bethlehem, or AT&T, whichever they can reach first?