Phone Companies Seeking Immunity Gave Money To Key Senator

The New York Times:

Executives at the two biggest phone companies contributed more than $42,000 in political donations to Senator John D. Rockefeller IV this year while seeking his support for legal immunity for businesses participating in National Security Agency eavesdropping.

The surge in contributions came from a Who's Who of executives at the companies, AT&T and Verizon, starting with the chief executives and including at least 50 executives and lawyers at the two utilities, according to campaign finance reports.

Read the whole story: The New York Times

Comments

[studlyguy]

the only thing that it looks like is going to save america going to fascism completely at this point is a revolution

[minervoice]

Jay's done a lot of good things for people in West Virginia, especially coal miners and retirees. This isn't one of them. One has to wonder why he'd put himself in this position when he didn't need to.

[NewsSophisticate]

Good ol' "telecom Jay"...I had this story on the the 19th.
"Sen. Jay Rockefeller, Verizon and AT&T's dirty "retro active immunity" threesome"
http://newssophisticate.blogspot.com/search?q=telecom+jay
Senator Jay Rockefeller loves those telecom lobbyists. Well at least since March 2007 he has. In the last 5 years Rockefeller received a

pathetic amount of funds from AT & T and Verizon. Nothing that could cause a controversy. That all changed in March when the wiretapping telecoms discovered the power of the chairman of the Senate Select Commitee on Intelligence.

Hmmm. Right about the same time "telecom Jay" received $48,500 in campaign contributions from the two companies, the government was intensifying their cases against them. Is Sen. Rockefeller trying to derail the investigations? Did "telecom Jay" use his 'influence' to give these complicit companies 'retro active' immunity?

According to Ryan Singel of Wired's, Threat Level, it appears so..and I must say, I agree."

Anyways..watch PBS tonight.."Showdown with Iran".
http://newssophisticate.blogspot.com/2007/10/must-see-tv-tonight-shutdown-with-iran.html
Watch the trailers and read the press releases. Your brain needs food, too. Don't get stuck watching Dancing with the Stars, the freak on House, those "terrorist hunters" on "the Unit", or that fat person loser show. Watch PBS tonight.

[ZHarris]

You know the fix is in, when their "justification" doesn't hold water.
----
Ms. Morigi, in Mr. Rockefeller’s office, said the senator had had numerous meetings with his aides about immunity for a year and came to believe that the carriers needed legal protection to ensure cooperation on national security operations.
-----
Like the telecoms wouldn't cooperate if they were actually served with a legal FISA subpoena.

[VastRightWingConspiracy]

.
Looks like the ultimate moneywhore, Conniving Calculating Cackling Clinton, has some competition! Poor Sen. Rockefeller probably doesn't get much from those West Virginia hicks, so he really needs to sell his votes and soul to the telcos.
.

[PoliticalPolyanna]

Uh . . . "ROCKEFELLER". No money needed. I agree with the poster below. It's about power.

[Bobleblah1]

There is no corporation in America with enough money to "buy" Senator Rockefeller. This is about power. He wants to consolidate and centralize power for a rich elite class of which he belongs.
This kind of gross legislative outrage is creating as well as worsening lawlessness in America.

[Danny]

Tell me, how can a Rockefeller BE BOUGHT? Tell me, a Rockefeller! How bad are things for the rich when a Rockefeller CAN be bought! Not to mention the less rich ...

[condieshoes]

Why are we surprised that a Rockefeller sided with entrenched ruling elite money? The ruling elite, want to run the world like a corporation and have been taking steps over a long period of time to do just that....take over. Stip money away for the American people, ie, jobs, labor unions, pensions and pension funds, NAFTA, CAFTA, WARS WITHOUT END FOR PROFIT AND MONEY.

And now, they have in store for us is: private police forces, a prision system that is outside of judicial review and redress, torture, slave labor in an enormous prision population that is growing daily, because of mandatory sentencing of some poor slob who has a joint in his pocket, while the huge drug money out of Afganistan is being run by the CIA inside this country.

A coup has taken place in this country and we are just now getting the drift.

[PollM]

Selling out America and the American people, the provision set a real bad precedence.Senator Rockefeller claims sharp increases in contributions from telecoms had no influence on his support for the immunity provision,

Is Senator Rockefeller a crook?--> http://www.youpolls.com/details.asp?pid=773.

[ashabot]

Rockefeller is still whoring himself for money? God damn! Doesn't that family have enough already? How much do these greedy bastard need? Sickening.

[bayviking]

Rockefeller money dwarfs Gates. So if, $40,000 buys his ass what semblance of Democracy remains?

[mrcontinental]

Come on! What else would you expect from a Rockefeller.

[helmboy]

I know. that family is evil and has been for over 100 years.

[Pippilin]

Accepting political campaign donations from
ANYone = legalized bribery. Before this country can even begin to resemble the one most of us want it to be it must renounce its
current mode of campaign financing, plug all loopholes,
and turn to public funding for ALL political
electioneering.
Otherwise the influence peddling by the largest of the donors will never stop and we, the people, will never benefit from
governmental 'largesse'.

[ilvlamp]

I agree. We need to have campaign finance reform, and get rid of the lobbyist poisoning our democracy.

I wonder how many political donations were received from the tobacco and insurance lobbyist to ensure SCHIP failed.

[LindaJay]

So he sold out the Constitution for 42,000 pieces of silver. Why am I not surprised?

[thromulese]

These people should recuse themselves from voting on anything that will have the appearance of serving their benefactors as apposed to following their constitutional duties of upholding the constitution.

After all, they DID take an oath in which they swear to uphold and defend our constitution. Nowhere in that document does it state that laws can be broken by the president using telecoms as the tool and then congress gives them a retroactive get-out-of-jail card.

(Ms. Morigi, in Mr. Rockefeller’s office, said the senator had had numerous meetings with his aides about immunity for a year and came to believe that the carriers needed legal protection to ensure cooperation on national security operations.)

Who are these aides? Dick Cheney and Joe (bomb Iran) LIEberman? Sounds like he started taking money from these criminals about the same time as he started contemplating immunity. Just a coincidence of course.

(“The idea that John Rockefeller could be bought is kind of ridiculous,” said Matt Bennett, vice president for Third Way, a moderate Democratic policy group that has supported immunity for the phone carriers.)

Can you say DLC? In kind of figures that a moderate dem (i.e. republican lite) group would back retroactive immunity. They are shameless pigs at the trough. And NO, I do not think it RIDICULOUS to imagine this political hack selling out the constitution for a few pieces of silver.

[Liberal2]

Well, Linda, you should be. The price for betrayal has gone up only a bit over 1,000 times from the biblical price. That fact alone, of inflation since 33 AD, surprises me. Excuse me while I go vomit.

[MinM]

Misplaced quotes

Surge in the "War on Drugs"

Fixed.