Bush's Protection Racket

http://rawstory.com/rawreplay/?p=638

Bush spoke first to the House of Representatives, then to the press on why the updated FISA bill should be passed in light of the expiration of the Protect America Act of 2007.

First let me note that Bush likes the Protect America Act - the provisional bill that was passed last summer as a stop-gap measure to allow the continued wiretapping of domestic communications while congress put together a more comprehensive bill, but the Republican house members voted against extending it another 21 days. Instead, they chose telecom immunity (a key part of the current draft of the new FISA bill) over the existing Protect America Act. The democrats chose to allow the Act to expire over the interests of telecom companies seeking liability protection via an Ex-Post Facto (read: blatantly unconstitutional) provision for handing over private customer information without a warrant.

Keep in mind that this simply means that the law in place since the 1970's is now back in effect - spying can occur, with cause and with a warrant from the secret FISA court. The only thing this expiry does is remove the government's right to spy on all domestic telecom traffic without a warrant for periods longer than 72 hours.


In my mind, this speech can be translated to:

"You should pay me what I've asked for. Or else something...you know...*really bad* might happen. I won't have anything to do with it, of course, I'm a good guy. But Johny, you see, over there, sitting in the corner...sometimes he gets violent, you know?

"All I'm trying to do is protect you, and you won't let me."

To head off arguments of the main weakness of this analogy: no, Bush doesn't have direct control over 'terrorists' as a mob head has over his hired muscle, but when any force is constant, control over the valve is control over the source.