via CommonDreams:
Published on Wednesday, June 25, 2008 by
Salon.com
Chris Dodd’s Speech and a Glimmer of Hope for Stopping the FISA Billby Glenn Greenwald
Back in December, Harry Reid’s plan was to have the Senate quickly pass the Cheney/Rockefeller FISA bill before the Senate recessed for Christmas. But Chris Dodd’s relentless delaying tactics — his filibuster and holds and other procedural tactics designed to block quick enactment of the bill, supported at every step by Russ Feingold — forced Reid to pull the bill from the floor and prevented the Senate from considering the bill until the following February.
At this point, procedural delay of that sort (as opposed to some principled stand against this bill by a majority of Senate Democrats) is the best hope, by far, for preventing enactment of this FISA bill. The Senate’s plan was to pass the bill and send it to the President before the July 4 recess, but that plan is somewhat in jeopardy now. The more a bill like this is pushed off into the future, especially in an election year consumed with other matters, the greater the likelihood that, through inertia alone, enough delay can prevent enactment this year. The probability of being able permanently to stop this bill is still quite small but, as a result of several important events yesterday, it is higher today than it was two days ago:
(1) Chris Dodd went to the Senate floor last night to speak against the FISA bill and delivered one of the most compelling and inspired speeches by a prominent politician that I’ve heard in quite some time. He tied the core corruption of the FISA bill’s telecom amnesty and warranltess eavesdropping provisions into the whole litany of the Bush administration’s lawless and destructive behavior over the last seven years — from torture and rendition to the abuse of secrecy instruments and Guantanamo mock trials — with a focus on the way in which telecom amnesty further demolishes the rule of law among our political class.
That speech signals that the small minority in the Senate devoted to stopping this bill have made this a priority. Small, vocal, passionate minorities in the Senate — backed up by vocal, passionate and engaged citizens — can do much to prevent a bill’s quick and painless passage. Dodd’s speech can be seen and/or read here. I highly recommend it, and if I had one wish this week, it would be that any journalist who will ever write or utter the words “FISA,” “telecom immunity” or “Terrorism” would be forced to watch this speech from start to finish without distraction. ......(more)
The complete piece is at:
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/25/9871/
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