I'm not a believer, but

Glenn Greenwald is saying things that are nice to hear. A whole bunch of Americans reared up, faced towards Washington and screamed "No!"

...both prongs of the White House's FISA demands -- increased surveillance powers and telecom immunity -- seemed to be an absolute fait accompli. It would all follow the same depressing pattern we've seen all year long whereby the President easily gets everything he demands from the Congress.

Thus, the usual roster of obedient establishment propagandists -- the David Igantius's and Fred Hiatts and Joe Kleins -- dutifully lined up (as always) to support the White House's demands, explaining condescendingly to the masses how Important it was for their Safety that telecoms receive something the masses would never get: immunity from having deliberately broken our laws for years. They further insisted that when the telecoms and high government officials broke our laws, it was only because they were acting patriotically, doing this all for our own Good (without mentioning that they were profiting immensely in the process). By that point, nobody other than blogs, the ACLU, EFF, and similar groups were paying the slightest attention to this lobbyist-led, bipartisan establishment scheme, which was well on its way to being implemented.

* * * *

But that's when something truly significant happened. The idea for a Dodd "hold" on telecom immunity spontaneously arose in several places on the morning of October 18, when the Cheney/Rockefeller deal was announced.

...
Without question, it was those efforts, spontaneously created and driven by blogs and their readers, which led directly to the principled stand Chris Dodd took yesterday in defense of the rule of law. This was not a process whereby some Beltway politician announced a campaign and then citizens fell into line behind it. The opposite occurred. The very idea for the "hold" originated among a few citizens, was almost immediately exploded into a virtual movement by tens of thousands of people, and was then made into a reality by a single political figure, Chris Dodd, responding to that passion by taking the lead on it.

Glenn links to a video of Sen. Dodd saying exactly that.

It's refreshing to think that deals that are only popular among the beltway crowd cannot withstand the spotlight of public scrutiny.

We ought to have more spotlights.

Yes, the cynic in me would admit that this is temporary, and that Dodd can afford to make this stand because his is not a frontrunner. But look at the opposing sides and then look at the scoreline. This should be over already - it should have been a blowout.

As it is, we're going into extra time.

I know without checking this blog's Google stats that this blog had nothing to do with it - but bloggers and blog readers played a big part in making this happen.

It's a good thing. Virtual grassroots! Using the very infrastructure the Telcos provide us to deny them immunity for their past misdeeds.

Invigorating, but kinda makes Net Neutrality seem like a bigger deal, no?