Posted on 07/09/2008 1:05:04 PM PDT by shrinkermd
WASHINGTON — More than two and a half years after the disclosure of President’s Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program set off a furious national debate, the Senate gave final approval on Wednesday afternoon to broadening the government’s spy powers and providing legal immunity for the phone companies that took part in the wiretapping program.
The plan, approved by a vote of 69 to 28, marked one of Mr. Bush’s most hard-won legislative victories in a Democratic-led Congress where he has had little success of late. And it represented a stinging defeat for opponents on the left who had urged Democratic leaders to stand firm against the White House after a months-long impasse.
“I urge my colleagues to stand up for the rule of law and defeat this bill,” Senator Russell D. Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, said in closing arguments.
But Senator Christopher S. Bond, the Missouri Republican who is vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said there was nothing to fear in the bill “unless you have Al Qaeda on your speed dial.”
Supporters of the plan, which revised the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, said that the final vote reflected both political reality and legal practicality. Wiretapping orders approved by a secret court under the previous version of the surveillance law were set to begin expiring in August unless Congress acted, and many Democrats were wary of going into their political convention in Denver next month with the issue hanging over them—handing the Republicans a potent political weapon.
So instead, Congress approved what amounted to the biggest restructuring
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Conrad (D-ND)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lincoln (D-AR)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Webb (D-VA)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
and 'Independent Democrat' Lieberman (ID-CT)
The kids are having a fit.
Those who give up a liberty for a little temporary security deserve neither and will lose both.
Benjamin was a smart guy. I don’t trust the government to stop at this. Once the government gives itself power, it rarely gives it back.
The ACLU is only $10 away from having this ruled unconstitutional.
Soon he will placing himself right of McCain, advocating a flag burning amendment and saying David Duke is a friend of his.
Barack Hussein Obama thinks he will be Mr President Obama in January. If you were a power-hungry stealth-communist on the cusp of assuming the highest office in the nation, with grand visions for remaking America, which way would you vote?
Put aside what she thinks about the merits of the bill, and put aside her liberal ideology for a minute. The vote won't make a difference in terms of her next Senate run, and will be long forgotten by 2012. By voting yes instead of no today, she would have decreased the left-wing heat on Obama (not much, but a little). Instead, she opted to draw a contrast between him and her with the vote. It's almost as if she's still in the running to be the Dem's nominee this year.
Hehehe, I was just going to post the same list, I see you got it from the same place I did... :-)
“I urge my colleagues to stand up for the rule of law and defeat this bill,” Senator Russell D. Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, said in closing arguments.
Why would Feingold be worried about the rule of law? McCain-Feingold violates the 1st Amendment and he doesn’t seem concerned about that at all.
How did McCain vote?
You are correct....... Her NAY vote was a great big “neener neener, I told you so” to the left.
Do you have a link to the full vote rundown? Thanks.
I’ll add that it was textbook Clintonomics for her to vote that way. We all know darn well she could care less about FISA and she voted NAY to stick it to Hussein and his followers. Just like all her votes and everything she says and does ~ strictly politics for her advantage.
Welcome to 1984. It’s telling that not a single Republican senator voted against this.
>>>>Obama promised to filibuster it but now has just thrown all his “civil liberties” base under the bus.<<<<<<
They got him the nomination.... he don’t need them anymore.
Now he has to concentrate on Joe Sixpack in the center.
Yes very telling, TROLL.
Telling that they want to protect your sorry ass even though you hate them.
So hypocritical, because if this same bill was introduced by a Democratic president all the fake conservatives would be screaming about how it is unconstitutional, but because it’s Bush’s bill we should all be assured that the government will only use this to protect us.
What you say is redundant because no democrat is going to put forth a bill to protect us from terrorists.
OH, I forgot, terrorists don’t really exist, right?
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