Bush to oppose more snooping

Yeah, you heard me, Bunky.

"This year's update" to the 1978 Foreign Intellegence Surveillance Act (FISA), reports AP's Jennifer Loven...

...allows the government to eavesdrop without a court order on communications conducted by a person reasonably believed to be outside the U.S., even when the communications flow through the U.S. communications network — or if an American is on one end of the conversation — so long as that person is not the intended focus or target of the surveillance. The Bush administration said this was necessary because technological advances in communications had put U.S. officials at a disadvantage.

So basically it extends the so-called "emergency" bill Congress passed before they went on vacation in August (ahem, this year). But Commander Guy is threatening to veto it.

Woohoo, you say? Did we luck out here? Well, not quite.

President Bush said Wednesday that he will not sign a new eavesdropping bill if it does not grant retroactive immunity to U.S. telecommunications companies that helped conduct electronic surveillance without court orders.

(Emphasis, of course, mine.)

A couple of the big telcos, prominently including AT&T, are faced with huge lawsuits over their giving up customer records snoopers without a warrant, losing which would cost them a bunch of bucks. (Now now, Bunky, don't be alarmed. If they lose to much the taxpayers will give them more. This is America, after all.)

Seeking to increase the pressure on the Democratic-controlled Congress, Bush said the update has already been effective, with intelligence professionals able "to gather critical information that would have been missed without this authority."

And turn it over to Faux News, no doubt.