Damn, damn, damn caving Dems! - Updated

OK. Nancy and Steny didn't vote for the damn thing, but they let it come to the floor. What is the point of being Speaker of the House if you can't keep something like this from passing? Remember that oath to uphold and defend the Consti-fracking-tution?

Phillip Carter at the WaPo:

Republicans and Democrats in Congress reached a breakthrough compromise yesterday on a bill that would dramatically revamp the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Most significantly, the draft legislation makes legal the president's probably previously illegal National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance program. If signed into law, the new bill would also immunize telecommunications companies from individual lawsuits over surveillance. (More than 40 such suits have been filed already.)

[Emphasis mine, of course]

There was and is no reason to grant immunity to telcoms and certainly not to provide wiggle room for the lawbreaking thugs in charge of the executive branch.

I feared this was coming and it has. I am furious with the Dems in the House of Representatives and, if I had the power, would vote every compromiser out in the next election. No mercy, no excuses, no exceptions.

Nancy, you're back high on my shit list. You could get off it by putting impeachment back on the agenda. Short of that, you're probably going to stay there. I expected more of a grandmother. Just saying. I don't even need to get started on Steny and Rahm. Grrrrrrrrr.

Addendum:
In my book, voting to violate the Constitution is difficult for me to distinguish from treason. Also just saying. Who needs to aid and abet enemies when we're destroying ourselves from within?

Asshats. The lot of them.

UPDATE:
So, I get to see headlines like this first thing in the morning:
Democrats Have Legalized Bush's War Crimes
AlterNet - 3 hours ago
Essentially, Bush was betting that even if his warrantless wiretap program was disclosed -- as it was in December 2005 -- that he could trust his Republican congressional allies to protect him and could count on most Democrats not to have the guts to ...
--the BB