viscousplatypus blarg

A couple of weeks ago I wrote to my Representative and Senators about the FISA Bill.

Carl Levin, Democratic Senator for Michigan, has issued a very well written email sent, presumably, to those constituents who urged representatives to vote no on the bill.

The email:

Thank you for contacting me regarding modifications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). I appreciate hearing your thoughts on this very serious matter.

On August 5, 2007, the President signed into law a temporary bill, the Protect America Act (P.L.110-55). This law contained a six month time limit in order to give Congress the opportunity to carry out a thorough, thoughtful examination of how to utilize complicated new technologies in the surveillance of suspected terrorists without invading the privacy of innocent Americans. In the months following the signing of P.L.110-55, Congress worked in a bipartisan manner to consider the best course forward to make permanent changes to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

On January 23, 2008, the Senate began consideration of the FISA Amendments Act (S.2248). Title I of this bill would provide the Intelligence Community with the necessary authority to collect intelligence information on suspected terrorists. I supported this section of the bill because the collection of that intelligence is important to securing our national security. Title I is based on an amendment Senator Rockefeller and I introduced during consideration of the Protect America Act, which was filibustered at that time.

Title II of S.2248, however, would grant retroactive immunity to telecommunication providers who disclosed customers’ communications and other confidential information at the request of government officials. This would eliminate accountability for such unlawful actions after the fact. Title II also would require the dismissal of lawsuits brought by persons claiming injury from interception and disclosure of their communications, even if the disclosure violated the constitutional rights of individuals whose personal information was illegally disclosed. Unlike Title I, there is no bipartisan agreement on Title II.

Retroactive immunity is not fair because it leaves American citizens who may have been harmed by the alleged unlawful conduct of these providers without any legal remedy. Many have expressed deep concern that if Congress were to agree to immunize private parties who participated in a program that appears to have been illegal, others might be encouraged to engage in such illicit activities in the future. In a free society, illegal activity cannot be excused on the grounds that government officials asked you to carry it out. There must be accountability for illegal acts.

There is, however, a way to protect telecommunication providers, who acted in good faith, based on the assurances of appropriate administration officials, without depriving American citizens of a legal remedy. I cosponsored an amendment to S.2248 that would have substituted the United States for the telecommunications providers as the defendant in lawsuits based on the actions of those providers. It is appropriate that the Government be liable rather than the telecommunications providers, since the disclosures were allegedly made in these cases at the request of senior executive branch officials to help safeguard U.S. security with assurances that the providers would be protected from liability regardless of the requirements of law.

This amendment would have protected the telecommunications providers from liability just as effectively as the retroactive immunity language in Title II of the bill. However, unlike the retroactive immunity language of Title II, it would not have left those who can prove they were victims of unlawful actions without a remedy. Unfortunately, this amendment was defeated in the Senate.

Although I supported Title I, of the FISA Amendments Act, I voted against the because it included retroactive immunity for telecommunications providers. The Senate passed S.2248 on February 12, 2008. The House is currently working on its own version of the bill. Any differences between the House and Senate versions will need to be reconciled.

Thank you again for contacting me.

Sincerely,
Carl Levin

Thank you, Senator Levin, for your candor on this issue.

Thanks also to Senator Dodd of Connecticut for his work to prevent this bill and other legislation like it from being passed.

Politicians: These men should be your models on this most fundamental of issues.

This past winter I helped copy edit a forthcoming O’Reilly book by local web optimization guru Andy King. It’s now available for pre-order.

I hadn’t done much editing since college, so it was a nice change of pace for my freelancing gigs. I’ve been doing more editing and writing for the web since.

Even with the full-time job, I’m still doing small projects here and there, mostly content development and small design overhauls for existing contracts, and projects for friends. So, feel free to ask.

Things That Don’t Suck from viscousplatypus on Vimeo.

For a friend who is compiling video of things that don’t suck. Pardon the jerkiness of the farmers’ market video. Was trying to shoot subtly. You can also watch the better-quality Quicktime version.

At the farmers’ market today I got a head of green lettuce, a jar of blackberry and rhubarb jam, donuts, a bag of Guatemalan Ethiopian dark roast from Roos, and lunch from Pilar’s Tamale Cart. After my trip by the library I stopped at Primo on Liberty for some reading and people watching.

The ever-vigilant Edward Vielmetti alerted locals over twitter and plurk that The Deuce has been added to the collection of cities with Google Street View.

The covered area is pretty much all the contents inside the major highways: 14, 23, and 94.

I thought I’d feel more weirded out than I do. There also don’t seem to be a lot of people out.

I know it’s old news, but now that it’s in my backyard, literally, I wonder what you folks think about Street View.

1. The first random Wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.
2. Go to http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3. The last four words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.
3. Go to http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/. Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover (refreshing is allowable to obtain a non-copyrighted picture).

Original photo by slidewayze.

Project started for the postORG wiki by poolnoodl.