There are some promising developments in the US House of Representatives. A new draft proposal would, rather than granting immunity to lawbreaking telecoms, allow telecoms to use classified information to defend themselves from lawsuits. Glenn Greenwald explains:

By including a provision that explicitly authorizes telecoms to submit to the court any exculpatory documents -- notwithstanding the assertion by the administration that those documents are subject to the "state secrets" privilege -- the House bill completely guts, in one fell swoop, the primary argument that, for months, has been made by telecoms and their allies as to why amnesty is necessary.

As Marcy Wheeler documented several months ago, the primary -- really the sole -- excuse given by the Senate Intelligence Committee as to why telecom amnesty was necessary was that the telecoms did nothing wrong but were being blocked by the administration from using the documents they have to prove it.

The real take away, for me, is that our message: "NO warrantless wiretaps and NO telecom immunity" is finally being heard by House leadership - so keep the pressure up! You can get your message across in 3 important ways:

1. Call your representative and tell them "NO warrantless wiretapping and NO telecom immunity". You can reach the Capitol Hill Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. Even if you do not know the name of your representative, they can connect you by looking up your address.

2. Sign the petition telling Speaker Pelosi and Hoyer "NO warrantless wiretapping and NO telecom immunity" at: www.aclu.org/encore.

If you are not currently on the ACLU action alert list, you can sign up at that website. It's important to get on the alert list so you can get updates when important legislation comes up.

3. Call 5 friends and ask them to call their representatives and sign the petition. You can find more information and talking points at: www.aclu.org/fisa

You can see Ed Yohnka, the Director of Communications and Public Policy for the ACLU of Illinois, give agreat discussion of the fight against wiretaps and immunity (along with Stephen Colbert's trenchant analysis) here.