Obama: Telecom Immunity Doesn't Override National Security

Okay, now I'm officially confused. Obama had originally promised to back the FISA bill but to work when president to remove the proposed Telecom immunity clause from the bill. I had always presumed that the Democratic leadership had been advised by Bush of what he was actually doing and that this was why the Democrats were so keen to push to give immunity.

But now the Democratic leadership are saying that they will support a filibuster while Obama is continuing to support the bill.

He has stated:

"The bill has changed. So I don't think the security threats have changed, I think the security threats are similar. My view on FISA has always been that the issue of the phone companies per se is not one that overrides the security interests of the American people."

However, Sens. Chris Dodd (D-CT) and Russ Feingold (D-WI) have promised to do all that they can to remove retroactive immunity from the legislation and Harry Reid's office has issued a statement saying that he will do all that he can to help them:

Unfortunately, the FISA compromise bill establishes a process where the likely outcome is immunity to the telecommunications carriers who participated in the President’s warrantless wiretapping program. Sen. Reid remains opposed to retroactive immunity, which undermines efforts to hold the Bush Administration accountable for violating the law. Thus, he will cosponsor the amendment offered by Senators Dodd and Feingold to strip out the immunity provision, and support their efforts to strip immunity on the floor.

Even Nancy Pelosi has stated that it would be "healthy and wholesome" were the Senate to filibuster the bill.

Obama's position makes no sense. He now says that going after the phone companies was never more important than finding out what actually took place here, which completely misses the point I think. Going after the phone companies was the only way we were ever going to find out what had taken place here.

And I had always presumed that he was reversing his position on the filibuster due to pressure from other Democrats, but with Reid and Pelosi now appearing to favour the filibuster I am left wondering why Obama is taking the position that he is taking.

Perhaps he is suffering from that continual Democratic fear of being portrayed as weak on national security by the Republicans going into an election, which is a great shame. Up until now Obama has been great at redefining these issues in a way that does not play into this Republican game plan.

Perhaps he's playing the long game, publicly supporting a bill that he knows will be filibustered by Dodd and Feingold, thus denying McCain the ability to label him soft on national security during the run up to the election. But, I freely admit, I'm grasping at straws here.

I previously thought I could see what he was up to, I have to now admit to myself that I don't.

Tags: barack obama, fisa, legislation, telecom immunity, phone companies, national security