FISA's been amended and we're going to Court!

As Washington state woke up and got to work this morning, President Bush signed the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 (FAA) into law. While Senators Cantwell and Murray voted against the bill, 69 Senators supported it, putting the bill in the President's hands to sign.

Barely an hour later, the ACLU's legal team filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of this new law based on privacy, free speech, and the separation of powers. As our national blog explains:

• The FAA violates the Fourth Amendment because it allows the government to gobble up the constitutionally protected communications of American citizens and residents without getting individualized warrants, and without specifying the time, place or length of the surveillance, and not specifying how the info gathered will be disseminated, or how long it’ll be kept. (You know, the who/what/where/when/why.)
• The FAA also violates the First Amendment by chilling lawful expressive speech without adequate justification by authorizing the government to intercept constitutionally protected communications without judicial oversight.
• The challenged law violates the principle of separation of powers by allowing the government to continue surveillance activities even if the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has deemed those activities illegal. (Good idea, right? Asking the government to obey the law?)

Legal documents, information about our plaintiffs, and a timeline of the development of FISA are up online. And for those looking for a shred of amusement in this dark time, Matt Bors' comic on America's New Phone Plan might just do the trick.