Marty Lederman, Anonymous Liberal, and Glenn Greenwald all have detailed posts up today on why the Senate should not pass legislation approving telecom immunity. All three rebut arguments being made as to why the telecom companies should be granted immunity.
Anonymous Liberal writes about how our laws are structured to make both the government and everyone else responsible for following the law:
our laws are designed to put independent pressure on both the government and third parties to comply with the law. That's why we have civil liability provisions. We don't believe, as a matter of policy, that only the government should be held to account for illegal conduct. And we understand that it is often easier to punish and deter illegal conduct by going after those who facilitate it. Again, that's why the law is structured the way it is.
The telecoms are not victims in all of this, and there's no good reason for granting them this extraordinary relief.
Make no mistake, while much of the discussion about FISA reform and retroactive immunity has focused on law suits on third parties, they are not the lone culprit. The Bush administration came to these companies and asked them to act outside the law. The Bush administration had eavesdropped Americans' conversations without warrant, in direct contravention to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The Bush administration's actions must be subject to Congressional investigation and oversight -- and lawsuits against the government on these matters must be able to proceed. That's required for the rule of law to maintain and it's necessary to keep the balance of powers between the three branches of government.
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