FISA Telecom Immunity Immutable Logic

As a person of logic and mathematics, it is abundantly clear to me that the telecom companies that participated in wiretapping at the behest of the Bush administration were committing a crime.  The conclusion follows from logic and the law of implication and transposition.

Follow the logic after the fold.

It is clear that no person or corporation requires immunity if what they did was legal.  Hence, we have:
If "act was legal" then "no immunity required".
Using the usual notation of P and Q, and applying the necessary condition logic:

Premise (1): If P, then Q
Premise (2): not Q
Conclusion: Therefore, not P

Substituting back in our conditions, not Q is not "no immunity required", i.e. immunity required, basically the same words used by the Bush administration and their Republican and Democratic enablers (Sen. Reid and Feinstein, for instance).  Not P becomes not "act was legal", i.e. "act was illegal".

In the words of many a math professor, Q. E. D.!

I suppose it should be said that there may be some nuance in the condition of "act was illegal" in that immunity is warranted to forestall a legal battle that would ultimately come out on the side of "act was legal".  I call bullshit on that from the outset simply because if there were wiretaps on citizens of and in the USA and there were no valid warrants for them, they are illegal ipso facto, by both the FISA and the Constitution.  Taking it further also implies that the Bush administration, and very likely GWB and RBC themselves are guilty of subverting the Constitution and breaking the FISA law.  This certainly also implies that they should be impeached, because those two items alone and by themselves constitute a High Crime or Misdemeanor as described in the Constitution.

The only way I would accept immunity for the telecom companies in question is if they actually testified that the Bush administration, via the NSA, FBI, and the DOJ, induced them to commit the illegal act of wiretapping w/o warrants.  That is what immunity is used for:  PROSECUTIONS OF BIGGER FISH.  Every lawyer in the land and any person with a modicum of common sense know this.  Heck, even someone w/o any common sense that does watch Law & Order knows it.

•  Tips for logic

  And the first logical thing that the Bush administration has apparently done.

  by DrSpalding on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:21:27 AM PDT

  •  Actually...

    they could ask for immunity if there was a reasonable question about whether the conduct was legal or illegal.  But in that case as a matter of law they could alsways plead that they took their lawyers' advice about the legality of their conduct and relied on it.

    But that assumes that their lawyers said that their conduct was legal.  And I doubt that was the advice they got...

    by Bartimaeus Blue on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:25:29 AM PDT

•  They also assuredly had advice of counsel

  about the legality of their actions.  

  But hey, logic works too...

  by Bartimaeus Blue on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:23:26 AM PDT

  •  I actually had that in the diary

    "telecoms acted over the objections of their own legal counsel" but I removed it because it sounded like an apology for them and I didn't want it to sound like that!

    by DrSpalding on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:24:52 AM PDT

    •  It would be a valid defense... but

      I do not doubt for a moment that their lawyers did not advise that the conduct was legal.  So they could not really rely on advice of counsel...

      by Bartimaeus Blue on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:26:27 AM PDT

•  They are post-logic.

  They don't want to follow the law. They don't think they have to follow the law. That's all this is about.

  Even they are not stupid enugh to actually believe what they say. All their "arguments" are rhetorical flourishes designed to get them through the minutes/days/weeks of whatever "confrontation" or "showdown" they're in. They're like an alcoholic changing the subject (Gee, why did I think of that analogy?).

  They simply want to do whatever they want. That's it and that's all. And throwing a few four-syllable words into the conversation lets them and their enablers think they are sage and sophisticated.

  by RickMassimo on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:35:29 AM PDT

•  The real deal, as I see it

  is that the telecom companies must be protected at all cost, because if they are sued there will be discovery, and the illegality of the administration would be exposed.  The Specter alternative seems to be supportive of this theory.  They really don't care about the telecoms, or certainly not as much as keeping their own asses out of jail.

  by beemerr90s on Thu Jan 24, 2008 at 11:54:51 AM PDT