It's taken a while for me to discover this story:

The nation's biggest telecommunications companies, working closely with the white house, have mounted a secretive lobbying campaign to get Congress to quickly approve a measure wiping out all private lawsuits against them for assisting the U.S. intelligence community's warrantless surveillance programs.

The campaign-which involves some of Washington's most prominent lobbying and law firms-has taken on new urgency in recent weeks because of fears that a U.S. appellate court in San Francisco is poised to rule that the lawsuits should be allowed to proceed.

I'm not based in the US, but I still find this well-financed attempt to earn a get-out-of-jail-free card disturbing nonetheless. Check out the full article on Newsweek.