AP:

A top Democratic leader [sic] opened the door Tuesday to granting U.S. telecommunications companies retroactive legal immunity for helping the government conduct electronic surveillance without court orders, but said the Bush administration must first detail what those companies did.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said providing the immunity will likely be the price of getting President Bush to sign into law new legislation extending the government's surveillance authority.

In a conference call with reporters, a senior [cough] Justice Department official called Hoyer's offer "encouraging" but would not commit to sharing the data.

Leave aside the absurd idea of trusting Bush to "detail" anything. How on earth do they plan to verify what they get?

The real issue is this: If, whenever major corporations break the law, Congress grants them retroactive immunity, what does the rule of law mean?

Answer: It doesn't mean shit. Of course, if a blowjob was at stake, we'd have heard of nothing but the rule of law from everybody on the RNC's distribution list for blastfaxes, from every Beltway stenographer, Joe Lieberman would have turned the sanctimony knob up to 11, and the entire Village would have in turmoil for years.

But it's only the Fourth Amendment and Constitutional government. Yawn.

So get ready. Typically, after sloppy seconds come bloody thirds.

Oh, and if, by some mischance, a Democratic staffer wanders in here, I'd say read these posts, at least. First, on McConnell's lies about the scope of the program, why the program must be ratfucking, and the technical details. The collected links on this topic are here.

NOTE Via TPM.

UPDATE As Greg Sargent points out, it's great to see the Democratic presidential candidates really stepping up to the plate on this one. Oh, wait...