Hooley's Holdout on NSA Rebuke--Why?

As I'm sure most of you are aware by now, this morning's USA Today contains the bombshell revelation that the NSA has been data mining billions of fully domestic telephone calls since 2001. On top of earlier revelations (and yesterday's abrupt cancelling of a DoJ probe), and in the context of Gen. Michael Hayden's potential appointment to Director of Central Intelligence, there is understandably some outrage afoot on both sides of the aisle, but particularly within the Democratic caucus.

As he has throughout the bad dream that is the Bush presidency, Rep. John Conyers is trying to hold the administration to account for its latest failings. He has filed amicus briefs in two pending cases, ACLU v NSA and CCR v Bush. The brief itself is a pretty thorough summary of the illegal shit that's being pulled, and is co-signed by 71 other Democratic House members. Among those 72 are Oregon's Earl Blumenauer, Peter DeFazio, and David Wu. Since we're certainly not expecting faithful Bush lapdog Greg Walden to sign, that only leaves...

Darlene Hooley.

If you live in Rep. Hooley's district as I do--or even if you live in one of the other four districts in Oregon--I strongly urge you to call her office (the DC # is 202-225-5711) and pointedly ask why Ms. Hooley has not yet signed on. Does she plan to? If not, how will she justify that to her constituency? I called a few moments ago and left a message with her Legislative Director, Mike Chris Huckleberry. Generally speaking it's difficult to get an immediate response, but should a number of inquisitive Oregonians start filling up his voice mail, he might be compelled to return a couple calls. And if you're reading this and are part of the state's media corps, how about picking up the phone yourself? Again, the question: why is Darlene Hooley alone among Oregon's House Democrats in not supporting the Conyers brief?