FISA Redux

Or, "Same Old, Same Old." The House-Senate "compromise," from all accounts, gives the White House more than it could have hoped -- and more than it got from the Congress when it was controlled by the Republicans. Andrew Sullivan seems to think it's not so bad:

Still: I'm not as livid as Glenn. At least the White House appears to have conceded that the Congress has the final say on what is and what is not legal in eavesdropping.

And if Congress is saying just what the White House tells it to say, what's the difference?

Here's Glenn Greenwald's analysis.

Now that Democrats have agreed to this bill, the GOP isn't even bothering with the pretense anymore that this is a "compromise." Instead, they're rubbing the Democrats' noses in the fact that this was a full-scale capitulation. From Eric Lichtblau's New York Times article:

With some AT&T and other telecommunications companies now facing some 40 lawsuits over their reported participation in the wiretapping program, Republican leaders described this narrow court review on the immunity question as a mere "formality."

"The lawsuits will be dismissed," Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri, the No. 2 Republican in the House, predicted with confidence.

The proposal -- particularly the immunity provision -- represents a major victory for the White House after months of dispute. "I think the White House got a better deal than even they had hoped to get," said Senator Christopher Bond, the Missouri Republican who led the negotiations.

Do you really need to hear more?