No Kool-Aid for Her

This woman sounds like the kind of conservative I remember from the old days.

She's a lifelong Republican, a proud conservative who rails against big government and doesn't have time for whiny liberalism. Now she's siding with the ACLU.

Strange times indeed, Theresa Fortnash says.

The Hollywood [Florida] woman has filed a lawsuit in Miami seeking to stop the government from gathering records on virtually every telephone call made within the United States. She wants a federal judge to block AT&T from handing phone logs to the federal government, even though President Bush says the program is critical to national security.

"I know people are going to say I'm hurting our country, and that's why I thought a long, long time before doing this," said Fortnash, a computer database designer and mother of a 10-year-old daughter. "But I love my country, and this program goes against everything our country is about and everything my party has been about."

[...]

Her lawsuit, which is seeking class action status, says the government and AT&T have ignored existing laws that allow for phone records to be turned over when a warrant or subpoena is issued.

"A government that doesn't abide by its own laws is a government that's out of control," said Fortnash's attorney John Gillespie, of the law firm Broad and Cassel. He also dismissed Administration claims that in a time of war, presidents have historically had broad powers to protect the country's citizens.

"If you take that argument, that in a time of crisis the federal government can do what ever it wants, that's just outrageous," Gillespie said.

[...]

Fortnash said she filed the suit because of that potential for abuse.

"I'm extremely passionate about this, because I work with data and build databases every day, so I know how much the federal government can do with a person's telephone information," Fortnash said. "I've been a Republican my whole life, and that's why I think it bothers me more than it would any liberal Democrat, because this goes against everything I've ever believed in."

Give that lady a subscription to The Nation.