FISA LTTE as sent.

[hootinholler]

I wish to congratulate Democrats in the House of Representatives for the recent stand against retroactive immunity for telecom complicity in the 'Warrantless Wiretap' program. Unfortunately our Maryland Senators failed us in any pretense of protecting our privacy by voting for this outrage.

Some telephone companies have apparently been complicit in abeting a lawless Administration. If in fact these companies broke the law to help the administration's clearly illegal program, they should be held responsible and punished. These companies' Massive legal departments were well aware that they have a legal obligation to hold our citizen's communications private. At least two of them did not (AT&T and Verizon), and one who did was punished by having lucrative federal contracts being withdrawn (QWest).

Details of this secret program are hard to find and tidbits that are available are under reported by the press. The whistleblower Mark Klein from AT&T has made public evidence that AT&T began feeding all telephone and internet traffic to the intelligence agencies in March 2001, six months before September 11, 2001! That suggests that the purpose of this program was not to track down the terrorists, but had some other purpose.

Senators Mikulskey and Cardin voted to move us as a nation farther into the darkness. They voted to plug our collective ears and shout "LA LA LA, I can't hear you" as the stench of the manure of this administration's criminality is piled upon and left to rot our Bill of Rights fills the land. Shame on you Senators! I voted for you to stand up and protect the constitution! Remember your oath and make this right.

To those who would spout the canard that "If you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear" I say that those of us who have done nothing wrong have the most to fear. Just ask those investigated by Senator McCarthy how that attitude worked out for them.

To the telecommunications companies, I ask If you've done nothing wrong, why do you need immunity?

We shall see if it gets published.

-Hoot

[tbyg52]

1. Very nice! Thank you. nt

:patriot:

[SeattleGirl]

2. Excellent letter, Hoot.

Hope it gets published!

[hootinholler]

6. Me too...

This is a bastion of republics in a blue state. The last one I got published drew 10 published responses.

-Hoot

[Hydra]

3. We can hope it will make the page

and that some people will see and understand.

There are no words to describe the nausea I feel when people say "If you're not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about!"

It is a small pleasure for me to know that they will be the first ones in the ovens.

[hootinholler]

7. Got a call from the paper today...

It's too long for a LTTE, he might run it as commentary on Sunday.

-Hoot

[Hydra]

8. Well, at least you didn't quite get the boot yet

Continued hope for your success

[bleever]

4. Nicely done, hoot.

K&R. :thumbsup:

[rockymountaindem]

5. The last line is very good

Kind of a "turnabout is fair play" deal, isn't it?