August 6, 2007 (LPAC)--Everything, and more, that was done under Dick Cheney's domestic surveillance program launched immediately after 9/11, is now "legal," thanks to the bill passed by the Democratic-controlled Congress in the hours before it adjourned for its August recess. On Sunday, President Bush signed the legislation which amends -- actually, obliterates -- the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which had prohibited the electronic surveillance of Americans without a court order.

Under the new law, the Administration can unconstitutionally monitor Americans' calls and emails, without a warrant, so long as there is some claimed connection to a person "reasonably believed to be located outside the United States." Not to Al Qaeda, not even to a suspected terrorist, but simply to "a person" outside the U.S., so long as "a significant purpose of the acquisition is to obtain foreign intelligence information."

The law also requires telecommunications companies to make their facilities available for government monitoring, and grants them immunity from lawsuits.

Today's New York Times cites Congressional sources saying that the law goes far beyond the fixes that the White House claimed were necessary to gather information about foreign terrorists. Those alleged "fixes" were necessitated by a secret ruling of the FISA Court, about five months ago, which further gives the lie to White House claims that there was some sudden urgency which required Congress to pass new legislation last week.