Black Box Report

For a long time, Democrats in Washington have complained, rightly, about the Wild West mentality of then Republican leadership. Chief among their complaints: an absence of accountability, and the prevailing appearance that corporate America came before the American citizen.

Well, Tom Delay and Bill Frist are long gone, so Harry Reid and friends are going to need to look into the mirror if they want to blame somebody for the latest travesty of justice. In effect, leading Democrats decided to go along to get along. If anybody can tell me why, I'd love to know.

Giving immunity without even getting all the facts is plain dumb. Giving immunity when laws were broken, that’s just wrong. One of the remaining voices with a clue, Connecticut senator Chris Dodd, said it best, “Immunity is a disgrace. It tells us some believe in the courts only so long as their verdict goes their way. It puts secrecy above sunshine."

He's right, of course. We have laws and basic rights in America, including the right to privacy. Some phone companies didn't turn over our records to the feds because they knew funny little things like warrants, court orders and, oh, I don't know, the law, actually matter.

To give this administration and those who aided and abetted illegal spying on Americans is as inexplicable as it is indefensible.

Democrats ought to be ashamed.