But not the way you think:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Thursday that she favors legal immunity for telecommunications companies that allegedly shared millions of customers' telephone and e-mail messages and records with the government, a position that could lead to the dismissal of numerous lawsuits pending in San Francisco.

This means the bill will reach the Senate floor and Dodd will get to lead a filibuster of it.

Oh by the way, how bad can Feinstein get?

Against the odds, Senator Chris Dodd has led the fight against FISA telco immunity.

The first step is to make sure retroactive immunity doesn't make it out of the Senate Judiciary Committee -- where it will be considered shortly.

If we can get it stripped there, it will have to be offered as an amendment to the overall bill where it will be a lot easier to get 41 votes against retroactive immunity than 41 to sustain my filibuster if necessary

This is a vitally important issue, as the Dodd campaign demonstrates in this video of the whistleblower Marc Klein, who told the story of the telco's failure to respect the privacy of its customers that the law (the Communication Storage Act) requires.

I try to stay on top of what Congress is doing but this one escaped me. And, since I'm not seeing much about it in the news or on blogs, I'm not the only one.

On the same day last week that the House passed the Ammonium Nitrate bill, it also passed HR 1955, titled the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007. The vote on this bill was 404 to 6. Meaning even progressive Democrats voted for it.

This is a thought-crimes bill, aimed at preventing domestic terrorism by judging the thoughts, including those expressed on the Internet, of American citizens.

If passed into law, it will also establish a co.mmission and a Center of Excellence to study and defeat so called thought criminals. Unlike previous anti-terror legislation, this bill specifically targets the civilian population of the United States and uses vague language to define homegrown terrorism.

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On the SJC page. Via the Daily Kos Live Blog, the schedule:

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One of the biggest disappointments of last night's debate for me was Senator Chris Dodd's refusal to discuss (sure Russert and Williams were not going to ask about it, but so what, thrust the issue into the debate) the raison de etre for his candidacy - restoration of the Constitution ad the rule of law. And today, as Glenn Greenwald discusses, Senator Jay Rockefeller reaches a new disgraceful low, as he argues for total disrespect for the rule of law:

Today there is significant debate about whether the underlying program -- the president's warrantless surveillance plan -- was legal or violated constitutional rights. That is an important debate, and those questions must be answered. In the meantime, however, these companies are being sued, which is unfair and unwise. As the operational details of the program remain highly classified, the companies are prevented from defending themselves in court. And if we require them to face a mountain of lawsuits, we risk losing their support in the future.

What drivel. Losing their support in what? Breaking the law? What in blazes is rockefeller talking about? The telcos will not honor duly issued warrants because they are being sued? Ah, there's the rub. Rockefeller does not believe in the NEED for the government and telcos to follow the law. What's the rule of law to Rockefeller? Nothing at all. He is a disgrace. More.

Breathe a sigh of relief. The House today passed a bill banning state taxes on internet access until before 2014. Since the Senate has already approved the measure, it goes to Bush for his signature.

Taxing consumers to access the internet is a horrible idea. And it wasn't just the tax:

Under the “streamlined” plan, a “national collection center” would be established and would monitor and store your personal information and Internet shopping habits.

Today, as it has for many many years, The New York Times today slams the sweet deal given to the American sugar industry:

[S]ugar supports cost American consumers — who pay double the average world price — more than $1.5 billion a year. The system also bars farmers in some of the poorest countries of the world from selling their sugar here.

The North American Free Trade Agreement is about to topple this cozy arrangement. Next year, Mexican sugar will be allowed to enter the United States free of any quotas or duties, threatening a flood of imports. Rather than taking the opportunity to untangle the sugar program in this year’s farm bill, Congress has decided to bolster the old system.

Big Sugar is not the only beneficiary of this corporate welfare. The farm bill is larded with subsidies and other rewards for agricultural producers. The eagerness of members of Congress to please their sugar daddies is not surprising. Campaign donations from the sugar industry have topped $3 million in each of the last four political cycles. American consumers and taxpayers, as well as poor farmers overseas, shouldn’t have to pay the price.

This is of course all true, but the sugar industry is not the only egregious manipulator of our political system. But I want to concentrate on a different point, of personal interest to me. It is the fact that this system does not protect industries and jobs - it protects fat wallets. The small Florida town I grew up in lost hundreds of jobs - the excuse?

With votes like these, it's difficult to believe the Democrats are the majority party in Congress. The Senate vote to advance the Dream Act failed today.

Supporters needed to get 60 votes to advance the DREAM Act, which would have allowed illegal immigrants who plan to attend college or join the military, and who came to the United States with their families before they turned 16, to move toward legality. The final vote was 52-44.

Despite efforts of Sen. Harry Reid and Dick Durbin, the Republican opposition framing the bill as one of amnesty prevailed.

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The House of Representatives passed a bill today restricting the sale of ammonium nitrate.

H.R. 1680, the “Secure Handling of Ammonium Nitrate Act of 2007”. The bill, sponsored by Congressman Thompson, creates a nationwide standard for regulating the sale of ammonium nitrate based fertilizers nationwide that could be used in terrorist acts, without unduly burdening the agricultural sector’s access to ammonium nitrate fertilizer for farming and other legitimate agricultural purposes.

I'm not impressed. It's another feel good bill. Ammonium nitrate is not a bomb. It's fertilizer. And do we really need another database?

The bill creates a national registry to monitor the purchase and sale of ammonium nitrate and matches the names of applying farmers against the terrorist screening database.

House chair Bernie Thompson says:

“As shown in Oklahoma City and incidents around the world, the threat from Ammonium Nitrate is real, and could be not ignored any longer. This is a common sense solution that strikes the right balance between ensuring access to ammonium nitrate for farmers and making it difficult for terrorists to attain.”

Couldn't be ignored any longer? OKC was in 1995, 12 1/2 years ago. I'm not aware of any repeats.

Here's a ten second music clip I found on an old album to play as you consider the legislation. Can any of you recognize the source?

And rightly so:

With Democrats Like These ...
Every now and then, we are tempted to double-check that the Democrats actually won control of Congress last year. It was particularly hard to tell this week. Democratic leaders were cowed, once again, by propaganda from the White House and failed, once again, to modernize the law on electronic spying in a way that permits robust intelligence gathering on terrorists without undermining the Constitution.

. . . There were bright spots in the week. Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon managed to attach an amendment requiring a warrant to eavesdrop on American citizens abroad. That merely requires the government to show why it believes the American is in league with terrorists, but Mr. Bush threatened to veto the bill over that issue.

Senator Christopher Dodd, the Connecticut Democrat, said he would put a personal hold on the compromise cooked up by Senator Rockefeller and the White House.

Otherwise, it was a very frustrating week in Washington. It was bad enough having a one-party government when Republicans controlled the White House and both houses of Congress. But the Democrats took over, and still the one-party system continues.

Join Senator Dodd in this fight.

Besides voting no (along with Sen. Russ Feingold), Sen. Ron Wyden may have inserted a poison pill in Senator Rockefeller's attempted FISA capitulation bill:

[P]assage in the committee came with one unexpected hitch. In an interview after the closed session, Mr. Wyden said he had succeeded, by a vote of 9 to 6, in adding an amendment that would offer additional protections by requiring that the government get a warrant whenever it wanted to wiretap an American outside the country, like an American soldier based overseas or a business person.

“The individual freedom of an American shouldn’t depend on their physical geography,” he said.

But Mr. Wyden said the administration vigorously opposed that measure and was threatening to veto any final bill if it is included.

Good work Senator Wyden.