On a vote of 69-28, the Senate approved the measure, previously passed by the House of Representatives, and prepared to send the legislation to Bush to sign into law.

With Bush’s term set to end in January, the vote marked perhaps one his final major triumphs on Capitol Hill and drew a firestorm of criticism from civil liberties groups.

The measure would replace a temporary spy law that expired in February and modernize the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, to keep pace with changing technology.

It would also bolster judicial and congressional oversight of U.S. surveillance of foreign targets and increase protection of civil liberties of law-abiding Americans swept up in such spy efforts — but not as much as critics charge is needed.

The bill authorizes U.S. intelligence agencies to eavesdrop, without court approval, on foreign targets believed to be outside the United States.

Critics complain this allows warrantless surveillance of the phone calls and e-mails of Americans who communicate with them. The bill seeks to minimize such eavesdropping on Americans, but foes say the safeguards are inadequate.

“The bill will keep us safe and protect our liberties,” said U.S. Sen. Christopher Bond, a Missouri Republican and a lead sponsor of the bipartisan compromise measure.

“This bill is not a compromise. It is a capitulation,” complained Sen. Russ Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat.

As for this post being “everything” one needs to know about FISA, I think not. One can assess the argument partially by the character of those making it. It does not bolster the objective discussion of Fourth Amendment rights to trot out Daniel Ellsberg as exemplar. Mr. Ellsberg is a radical snitch who not only betrayed his own liberal political allies, broke laws concerning national security, and continues today encouraging others to violate the law by revealing classified information to the NY Times, but he is an unabashed icon of the radical left. His views of the U.S. Constitution would interest me more if he put as much faith in the average cop about the Fourth Amendment as he does in the likes of Howell Raines and Jason Blair at the Times regarding the First Amendment.

Further, let’s not be so callow as to believe opponents of this overhaul are entirely pure in their motives. The immunity from lawsuits granted to telecom companies that acted in good faith under governmental direction is a central point of contention. The currently pending lawsuits in that regard would make a large number of trial lawyers very rich.

It is tempting to trash the Bush administration for FISA, but one must pragmatically look at the compromise hammered out in the House by Liberals, not Conservatives. We simply cannot afford to live smugly in a world of hypothetical ideals. We must survive in the world that is. The real world is one of well-considered trade offs and tough decisions. It’s a world where shadowy surrogates of a radical state might plan a nuclear attack and carry out tactical operations on disposable cell phones. This bill is going to pass.

I don’t consider myself overly paranoid, but the many layers of protection Americans have enjoyed for decades have decomposed faster than the porch at 93 East Ave.

Thanks for listing the phone numbers TG…..hopefully folks will use them.