In a breathtaking display of cravenness, Senate Democrats (including Candidate Barack Obama) confirmed (HR. 6304) that there is a two-tiered system of the rule of law in America. The first tier applies to you and me: we follow the law or suffer the consequences. The second applies to those with deep pockets who break the law and buy their way out of jail.
The Senate ratified this double-tiered system by granting retroactive immunity to telecom companies who broke the law by abetting President Bush in illegal, warrantless sweeps of Americans’ telephone and email communications. How extensive was this unlawful surveillance? Who authorized the telecoms to break the law? Are violations ongoing? Thanks to supine legislators, we will never know. Invertebrate senators voted to grant retroactive immunity without knowing who or what they were forgiving. Profiles in Fecklessness, indeed.
By ceding that, if the President orders something it is - ipso facto - legal, we have returned to the 18th century monarchical model against which the Founders rebelled. We are, once again, a country not of laws, but of men.
“There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty." (John Adams, 1772)
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