The U.S. Senate overwhelmingly voted Wednesday to grant retroactive amnesty to the telecoms that aided the President Bush's five-year secret, warrantless wiretapping of Americans, and to expand the government's authority to sift through U.S. communications, handing a key victory to the Bush administration.

The Democrats' presumptive presidential nominee Barack Obama (D-Illinois) voted for the final bill... New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, Obama's former rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, voted against the bill.

Dosedo? Now that he is the nominee he needs to play to the right, whereas her actions have little long term consequence. Clearly this is a signal that mainstream Americans don't care if anti-terror forces obey the law, but I could have told you that.

Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pennsylvania) stressed that Congress was violating the separation of powers by interfering with the courts.

"This may be a historical embarrassment," Specter said Wednesday morning on the Senate floor. "Everyone knows we don't know what the program did, but here we are giving immunity to the telephone companies."

The Padilla case, and Gitmo, are the historical embarrassments. This telco stuff is but a footnote... perhaps an example that demonstrates Congress was unwilling to act. I'm not sure I completely understand the constitutional issues here but I'll bet the EFF/ACLU have a filing in order that should enlighten us, and I doubt the court system is going to pass on it if its credible. The EFF may have their day in court yet, but I suspect little will come of that anyway.

In general, accountability for the excesses of the GWOT can only be political. Bush has clearly demonstrated that the legal system does not literally constrain his actions. Surveillance laws can be ignored, American citizens can be seized on U.S. soil and held for many years without trial, tortured to the point where they don't really know who they are any more, and there is no accountability whatsoever.

The court system is an effective check upon the legislature, but only Congress can check the executive, and they'll only do it if large numbers of people demand it... A gapping loophole in the protections afforded by our social order. There is, ultimately, no escape from the tyranny of the majority.

For the record, I'm not terribly concerned about the rest of the compromise absent immunity. As previously noted here its cleaner than previous versions. Thats really what the EFF won at trail... a means to keep dishonest men from rewriting FISA.

Senate Approves Telecom Amnesty, Expands Domestic Spying Powers | Threat Level from Wired.com