FISA: The RESTORE Act (UPDATE)

Okay, I can agree that the RESTORE acronym is kind of lame. Beyond that, I have a couple of observations to make about Paul Kiel's piece (published by TPM) on the FISA rework.

The bill would also make clear that foreign to foreign communications do not require a warrant.

Big deal. Constitutional protections do not extend to foreigners. A more interesting question involves international treaties to which we may be signatory. Of course, no-one in Washington ever pauses to think about those.

Four times a year, the Justice Department's inspector general would perform an audit of the program.

Good, but not enough. From day one, I've always said that a FISA rewrite should emphasize congressional oversight.

And the Department would be required to maintain "a database of all Americans subjected to government eavesdropping without a court order, including whether their names have been revealed to other government agencies."

This is the most troubling and important sentence in the piece. The minimization procedures in effect since 1978 (and -- yes, I'm going to say it again -- which were kept in effect by the Protect America Act) specifically forbid revealing names to other government agencies. In fact, they forbid the maintenance of the database required by the new proposal!

No, really. See here:

(4) notwithstanding paragraphs (1), (2), and (3), with respect to any electronic surveillance approved pursuant to section 1802(a) of this title, procedures that require that no contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party shall be disclosed, disseminated, or used for any purpose or retained for longer than 72 hours unless a court order under section 1805 of this title is obtained or unless the Attorney General determines that the information indicates a threat of death or serious bodily harm to any person.

(Sneaky bastard that I am, I have just now tried to force my readers to read the law which they have long refused to read, even though they claim to know more than I do about FISA. I can hear my readers right now: "Nasty Cannonses tries to make Smeagol read law! Smeagol HATES to read law! Smeagol REFUSES to read law! Smeagol HATES nasty Cannonses, yes, my precious, HATES Cannonses...")

UPDATE: William Pitt continues to be one of the few voices of sanity left in Progressiveland.

Why is this so bad? It restores FISA oversight, doesn't let telcoms who participated off the hook, establishes FISA as the controlling law for electronic surveillance, establishes that FISA can't be modified by fiat, and requires Justice to hand over all the surveillance materials they collected without court approval.

As usual, Think Progressive Purist proves to be the most jackass-riddled site on the left side of the web. In response to the above, we get this typical Dem-hate response:

I will no longer vote for ANYONE, since my vote means NOTHING anyway…….

The Dems are caving; the Dems always cave; do not support the Dems: That is the script, and the progressive purists will continue to recite it, no matter what the facts on the ground may be. If the Republicans are not secretly funding TP, they are missing the opportunity of a lifetime.