The end of any argument for the legitimacy of retroactive telecom immunity

Glenn Greenwald makes a terribly important (and largely forgotten) point about the sheer, despicable dishonesty and complete bad faith of Bush and every single Republican legislator supporting his absurd claim that we need to give the telecoms immunity for violations of FISA in the past so they will continue to cooperate:

One other vital point: The claim that telecoms will cease to cooperate without retroactive immunity is deeply dishonest on multiple levels, but the dishonesty is most easily understood when one realizes that, under the law, telecoms are required to cooperate with legal requests from the government. They don't have the option to "refuse." Without amnesty, telecoms will be reluctant in the future to break the law again, which we should want. But there is no risk that they will refuse requests to cooperate with legal surveillance, particularly since they are legally obligated to cooperate in those circumstances. The claim the telcoms will cease to cooperate with surveillance requests is pure fear-mongering, and is purely dishonest.

That point is completely dispositive of Bush's argument. Case closed, shut up.