The Telecom Spying Coverup
by Glynn Wilson
Former Bushie loyalist Attorney General John Ashcroft is now a lobbyist for the telecommunication giants. His latest assignment? Use the New York Times editorial page as a forum to bully the United States Senate into granting legal immunity to AT&T-BellSouth, Verizon and other telephone and Internet companies that went happily along with the Bush administration's plans to obliterate American civil liberties and spy on the enemies of the Republican Party.
Honestly, I don't know why the Times allows its opinion pages to be used in this manner, and just when they had gotten rid of charging for Times Select and I was beginning to think that paper may regain some of its credibility in the world of online journalism.
Ashcroft now admits that the illegal spying took place, but argues that the companies should be allowed off the legal and financial hook for doing it.
"Assuming that the country’s communications companies helped the National Security Agency track Qaeda operatives and other terrorists after being assured that their conduct was lawful, they acted as patriots, not privacy violators," Ashcroft spins.
What he doesn't admit is that all those phone calls and e-mails that were spied on - and are still being intercepted - are not just calls and e-mails by "terrorists" overseas.
As we have documented here before, and a few other news organizations too, including the Times, the Bush spy agencies and their corporate collaborators were spying on non-profit groups who support peace in the Middle East and a clean environment, as well as journalists and bloggers who wrote about those issues and were critical of the Bush administration.
The federal courts and the Bush IRS have also been illegally misused in the same end game, and that game is to shut down dissent in this country while going on TV every day and making speeches about promoting "peace" and "freedom" and "liberty" around the globe to fool enough of the people for the Republicans to continue winning elections.
The vast majority of Americans are already onto what is going on in Washington. They know now that everything that Bush and his loyal agents say is what George Orwell called "double speak."
But it seems many members of Congress are so out of touch with their constituents that they do not realize the people want their Representatives and Senators to stand up to Bush for them. The masses do not want more waffling and partisan games and more of the Washington two-step.
The Senate Judiciary Committee looked stronger when they were in the minority and then when Karl Rove and Alberto Gonzales were still in their jobs in Washington. Since their ignoble departure in August, the committee has gone as limp as Dick Cheney's dick without Viagra - and the polls reflect that.
Among the presidential candidates on the Democrat side, only North Carolina's former Senator John Edwards has consistently stood up to Bush on this issue. To his credit, Rep. Dennis Kucinich introduced House Resolution 333 in April to impeach Vice President Cheney for his pre-war lies about Iraq and for threatening an invasion of Iran.
House Speaker Nanci Pelosi has blocked Judiciary Committee hearings on Kucinich's bill, but Kucinich is vowing to force a full floor vote this Tuesday using his right of personal privilege, although the effort seems doomed to fail.
But where is the outrage from Democrats, independents and libertarians on our Fourth Amendment rights?
What I want to know is this. Will Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama and Senator Patrick Leahy stand up for us? And for that matter, what about New York Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sultzberger? Times executive editor Bill Keller? And what about editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal?
We know the Newhouse family and their hinterland publishers in Alabama care more about keeping the money train rolling than standing up for civil rights and liberties.
And we know the not for profit press like Harper's magazine and The Nation will take a stand, along with a host of non-traditional media outlets like this one.
The question is: At the end of the Bush Empire, will there be anything of the American experiment in democracy left to protect?