Over at Slate, I call Republicans to task for flip-flopping on the rule of law:
Republicans scored a victory yesterday—with the help of many Democrats and independent Joe Lieberman—with the Senate’s spy bill. The legislation would give retroactive immunity to telecom companies who have shared customer data with the government in violation of the law, and it would expand the government’s ability to spy on Americans’ international phone calls without court oversight. Conservatives were ecstatic. “Immunity is very, very important, obviously, to get the full capability and cooperation we need,” Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson, R-Texas, said yesterday. And yet this enthusiasm for telecom immunity is a betrayal of a principle Republicans love to invoke in other contexts. “America is based on the rule of law, and that law must be enforced,” Sen. Hutchison thundered during last year’s immigration debate. The conservative arguments against forgiving illegal immigrants apply with equal force to the telecom industry, even if no one made them yesterday.
The Senate legislation must now be reconciled with the House version, which does not include retroactive immunity. Given that the Democrats control both houses of Congress, you’d expect they’d come up with something closer to the House version, but I’m not going to hold my breath.
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