Bush pledges to veto 30-day FISA extension

Current federal surveillance legislation will expire at the end of this week, and with Congress potentially at an impasse, President Bush has ruled out the possibility of a short term extension for the current law. Some Democrats reportedly supported a 30-day extension of the current Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to help legislators sort through the telco immunity issue and reach either a consensus or compromise under which they would include it or not include it in the new surveillance act (Sounds like a toss up, and that's exactly how most of the news coverage is reading it).

One way or another, it looks like something will happen by this Friday, but will it be the right decision, or just the choice that had the slightest edge at the right time? President Bush obviously wants to force Congress to move on a version of the act with telco immunity included. Will he use some of his final State of the Union speech tonight to argue his case?

For more:
- read this story in The Washington Post

Related articles:
- A Senate bill without the telco immunity provision failed last week