The entire letter is as follows:

Thank you for writing me regarding your opposition to retroactive amnesty for telecommunication companies under investigation for illegal wiretapping. Please excuse the tardiness of this response. I agree with you.

Both the Bush Administration and these telecommunications companies knew that wiretapping without a warrant through FISA was illegal. Now they are being given protection from the constitution, a move which not only hurts the investigation, but stands in the face of justice. Know that from my seat on the House Judiciary Committee I have fought against allowing immunity to these companies, and I have voted against it when it came before me. Please be assured of my continued support on this important matter.

Again, thank you for contacting me. Please do no hesitate to be in touch in the future on this or any other issue of concern.

Sincerely,

Anthony D. Weiner
Member of Congress

Ok. Plan of action.

Every Dem who voted to gut our civil liberties gets targeted in the primary.

Particularly if there is no Dem winner tonight, pin down the candidates now. Make both of them promise to spearhead the repeal of this shockingly disgusting legislation next year. First thing they do in office, first 100 days in office. Repeal the retroactive immunity. Period.

There should be no waffling on this and no triangulation. This is nothing less than fulfiling their oath of office.

I’m sure the Constitution was framed in a way so as to thwart the formation of political parties, but those widgets were amended out. There were warnings aplenty about permitting power to coalesce in a central location, too, but the people didn’t pay attention to that either.

It’s foolish to trust governments or politicians. They are damn good liars, cheats and thieves. The cream of the crop, as it were.

exactly right and very well said, imo.

and it goes double for the politicians of our own party, because they the ones who will try to fool us – the Rs don’t care what we think, they’re too busy trying to fool their own proles.

that said, i’m very grateful for what he did do, and i don’t regret sending his campaign two (sadly small) contributions.

but i’m not going to pretend he did something that he didn’t do.

Fifteen days. We are off for a week, so maybe it has to be 25 days. I don’t know. I don’t care about that. We could have the same bill on this floor from the House. I am convinced of it. It is human nature. Give them a chance to have a grudge. I am going to meet with the chairman tomorrow. Let him rip into me for not giving the House an adequate chance for the second time to discuss this matter. But I am absolutely convinced that we could have that bill on the floor in this body and pass it and send it to the President. Why they don’t want to do that, I do not know.

Senator Rockefeller – Feb 14, 2008 (Page 1037)

If the plan all along was to give Bush everything he wanted, as it obviously was, why not just do it at the beginning?

But he gave the answer earlier. The House is pissed that the Senate and WH tried to jam the bill down their throats. That sort of action is too strong and/or an obvious erosion of the principle (or illusion) of independent decision-making, and couldn’t be allowed to run without a fight.

Senator Rockefeller noted exactly this, a couple weeks ago when the House left town without taking up the bill, after the GOP (and WH) said “no frickin’ way” to an extension. Rockefeller said (this is my paraphrase, not a direct quote) “the House is pissed because we tried to jam this, it’s human nature. Give them time and an opportunity to save some face, they’ll come around and pass the Senate bill.”

FISA is just one more in a series of examples. It’s foolish to trust governments or politicians. They are damn good liars, cheats and thieves. The cream of the crop, as it were.