Here’s a pop quiz:
You’re on your way to an important meeting with a close business associate and you’re running very late. Your associate reminds you that the client you’re meeting hates to be stood up and suggests that you speed up. You tell your passenger that you’re going at the speed limit but they start getting agitated and say you’ll probably lose the client if you continue at this speed. Besides, they say, there are no cops in sight.
Fearful of losing the client and angering your associate further, you put the pedal to the metal and start to make up for lost time. Everything seems to be going fine until you see the blue and red lights flashing in your rear view mirror.
Question: Who’s guilty here, and who gets the ticket?
It might take a philosophy major to figure out precisely how the guilt is spread around here, but you know damned well who is going to be getting that speeding ticket. That’s why it boggles my mind that our Senate is actually considering granting amnesty to Verizon, AT&T, and any other companies who broke the law and violated our Constitution when they agreed to assist the US government in their
warrantless wiretap programs. This is not the one-off kind of spying incident that cost President Nixon his office; this was a wholesale operation that required the carriers to build special
secret rooms within their facilities that are eerily similar to those formerly used by the KGB and other Eastern Bloc security agencies to monitor their own populations.
It’s not like the carriers did not have a choice here. At least one company, Qwest Communications, did stand up and
refuse the government unlimited access to their lines on the grounds that it was illegal. Of course they mysteriously started to lose whatever government
contracts they had and, ironically, their reluctance to cooperate may be at the root of some of their other recent legal troubles.
So if the phone companies knowingly participated in something that was so obviously of questionable legality, why the hell is Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid supporting legislation that would give these folks
immunity from the kinds of prosecution and lawsuits that you or I would face if we decided to tap our neighbor’s phones?
The stakes in this issue are much higher than whether or not these companies should hang for following the illegal orders of a government agency. Right now, the civil court system stands as the last barrier to future members of the Executive branch creatively re-interpreting the Constitution as they wish, or even completely ignoring it. What would the future look like if the telcos (or any other company, for that matter) did not have to worry about the legal consequences of their actions as long as they were sanctioned by a top government official? I’m not sure exactly what it would look like, but history shows us several scenarios in Russia, East Germany, Syria, Iran and Iraq that might give us a clue.
Of course we cannot completely hamstring the security programs that monitor potential threats to our nation. Senator Feingold’s recent statement opposing the S. 2248
bill strikes a good balance between allowing our security agencies to do their job and preserving the legal checks and balances that preserve the essential rights and freedoms that make our nation so great.
The backers of the S. 2248 bill put our nation in as grave a danger as any terrorist could by using the very telecommunication technology that powers our economy to undermine our basic rights to privacy, due process, and a justice system that is not unduly influenced by political pressures. If we want our children to grow up with the same freedoms and rights that we grew up with, we must all contact our senators and tell them to either kill S.2248 or at least make sure that our telecom industry remains legally accountable for its actions.
Here you can obtain the contact information for your representatives.
Remember, the democracy you save may be your own.
Comments? Questions? Federal subpoenas? Write me at
lhg at en-genius dot net or post your thoughts on our blog via the link below.
