This bill was completely watered down and subverted from the original, to the point where even many of its initial champions turned against it. Voting it down was the right choice. The worst thing would have been to have passed it and pretended that "reform" had been made.
Google, MSFT, Apple, the EFF all supported this bill. Obviously there are further improvements that could be made, but instead of starting from a better platform, we're at ground zero with an incoming congress that has no interest in curbing the 'military' power of the US.
The EFF's case for supporting the bill that was just killed is very clear about this:
While you are correct that there's no such thing as perfection, this bill is so far from the changes that are needed that its arguably not worth passing. When you pass a watered-down bill, that buys a decade or more for the opposing side. When it gets voted through, all of a sudden they imagine themselves as champions of compromise and at the same time delude themselves into thinking that they gave their opposition a gift. If an inadequate bill passes, that's likely all we are going to get for the next 10-20 years.
Obama can update the EO's for the NSA without congress[+].
[+] EFF: "Future reform must include significant changes to ... Executive Order 12333, and to the broken classification system that the executive branch counts on to hide unconstitutional surveillance from the public."
He just doesn't want to stick his neck out.
So this bill was a distant 3rd choice for the country.
1) pass a good law
2) administrate the NSA into compliance
3) pass muddled legislation in a lame duck session
Maybe. But by passing anything that politicians (and virtually no one else) currently cry 'terrorism' over, we'll get a chance to see that the sky did not fall after all, and an incrementally better bill could be plausibly considered with incrementally more reasonable debate.
