Playing Politics with National Security
The Senate will not be passing the Patriot Act as currently approved by the House. The Republicans in the Senate could not overcome a filibuster threat by a vote of 52-47.

Republicans congressional leaders had lobbied fiercely to make most of the expiring Patriot Act provisions permanent. They also supported new safeguards and expiration dates to the act's two most controversial parts: authorization for roving wiretaps, which allow investigators to monitor multiple devices to keep a target from evading detection by switching phones or computers; and secret warrants for books, records and other items from businesses, hospitals and organizations such as libraries.

Feingold, Craig and other critics said those efforts weren't enough, and have called for the law to be extended in its present form so they can continue to try and add more civil liberties safeguards. But Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and House Speaker Dennis Hastert have said they won't accept a short-term extension of the law.

The AP also apparently couldn't resist taking a shot at the President as well:

[T]he Patriot Act's critics got a boost from a New York Times report saying Bush authorized the National Security Agency to monitor the international phone calls and international e-mails of hundreds perhaps thousands of people inside the United States. Previously, the NSA typically limited its domestic surveillance to foreign embassies and missions and obtained court orders for such investigations.

Base10 doesn't think Congress should be allowed to go home for the holidays until they agree on extensions to the act. Shame on you Senators!
- posted by Base10 @ 3:55 PM