Democrats Defeat Online FOS Act 782
not so anonymous writes "The Online Freedom of Speech Act was defeated in the House of Representatives yesterday. The Act would have immunized political bloggers from having to comply with hundreds of pages of FEC rules." From the article: "In an acrimonious debate that broke largely along party lines, more than three-quarters of congressional Democrats voted to oppose the reform bill, which had enjoyed wide support from online activists and Web commentators worried about having to comply with a tangled skein of rules. The vote tally in the House of Representatives, 225 to 182, was not enough to send the Online Freedom of Speech Act to the Senate. Under the rules that House leaders adopted to accelerate the process, a two-thirds supermajority was required."
Lovely Omission (Score:4, Insightful)
Ok, so I'm dusted. I see that the most liberal of parties opposes what is effectively Free Speech and the party which brought us the Patriot Act is advocating the it.
This means there's some reason other than what this post appears to say 'Hey, Democrats hate free speech!', like something has been attached which allows oil drilling in Yosemite National Park. From TFA:
Ah, there's the Why, a loophole for Campaign Finance law.The heading Democrats Defeat Online FOS Act and omission of the Why certainly colours this article. Why the omission? It appears the article poster favours websites/blogs which are covert mouthpieces of a particular interest group spouting dubious facts and leaving out highly relevant facts. Slashdot has effectively been trolled. Was this intentional, Zonk?
When black apears white or pigs appear to have sprouted wings, there's usually politics behind it, that's where Critical Thinking separates the herd. The Fine Print: We're probably not responsible for content, but in any event we are, we'll deny it.
What a joke (Score:4, Insightful)
It is impossible for the Democrats to stop anything in the House.
Freedom of speech had nothing to do with it (Score:1, Insightful)
No principles here, move along...
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:3, Insightful)
Uh, that was the WHOLE POINT (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:That's a switch (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:3, Insightful)
The linked article appears to be factual and fair, but the article synopsis certainly isn't.
Re:Legislation is one thing, enforcement is anothe (Score:2, Insightful)
All it takes is one example. They don't have to go after every blog. Just a couple of them. A couple of high profile prosecutions will make political blogging a different sort of beast. FACE didn't require that every abortion protestor be prosecuted. A few prosecutions and everyone with half a brain and something to lose will conform.
LK
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh, no doubt about it. You could have your site with .tv tld and most people wouldn't even assotiate it with Tuvalu and you could put whatever you like on it and host it in China or Cuba or Venezuela.
Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
The other thing that bothers me is the two party political system. Why wouldn't democrats want to protect our speech online? It seems all they're interested in is opposing the republicans these days (I used to be a republican, but I don't think they stand for conservatism anymore, so I'm libertarian/independent/non-incumbant now).
We need politicians that will bring us back to the freedoms our country enjoyed two hundred years ago, but everyone is interested in towing the party line--it seems even the voters. If you are of voting age, and in the US, please consider third-party candidates in the '06 congressional elections. I want to be part of a larger group than 0.5% of the population.
That's a lot of trouble to go to (Score:1, Insightful)
I can't stand (and thus, don't read) the wingnut blogs from the far end of either party... but if I want to catch up on how a pending election is going to realistically impact something I actually care about, I want to be able to read what some people would certainly consider political blogs, and right up until I cast a vote. And considering my ecclectic interests, I know that the people posting meaningful content covering what I can't see through the normal media sure as hell can't afford to do what they do and even begin to think about whether they are or aren't compliant with election bookkeeping rules. Blocking this measure was stupid, counter-constitutional, and just objectively the wrong thing to do.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Uh, that was the WHOLE POINT (Score:2, Insightful)
Under campaign finance laws they would only be required to divulge sources of funding.
Even that could be well hidden, say, a voting machine vendor who heavily favors a certain presidential candidate could take out a lot of lucrative ad-space on a site, so long as the views expressed on the site coincide with those of the company.
*wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge*
Right?
Re:It's not just blogging! (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that it is uniquely easy for J. Random Citizen to disseminate his own message of rebuttal.
Re:mirror world? (Score:1, Insightful)
Not sure the dems were ever friends of free speech (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
It's the "Old Game"
Like the Fillibuster, both parties have benefited from it over the years and are unlikely to put a stop to it, lest it come back to haunt them. Interestingly the GOP moved to end Judicial Fillibustering, which many old party members were loathe to do, even as the Dems frustrated them. They could find, in a decade, a reversal of political fortunes and find they can't stall appointments of judicial candidates far to liberal for their tastes.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:3, Insightful)
Which still makes it odd for Democrats to oppose it as far as I can tell. In my state the best funded 527 groups are liberal groups.
And this open a completely different can of worms: Campaign spending "reforms" are, IMO, unconstitutional nonsense. There's nothing in the freedom of speech clause that says its only free speech up to a certain artificially imposed spending limit. Things like yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre and libel/slander aren't meant to be restrictions on free speech the way campaign spending restrictions are meant. And there are equally deep pockets on both sides willing to spend to get their side heard.
The few people I've ever know anyone dumb enough to be swayed by a last minute campaign nasty-ad are also the people who don't trouble themselves to go vote anyway.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What a joke (Score:2, Insightful)
If only a simple majority was needed, the bill would have passed. Instead, the rules required a supermajority, which meant that it would need support from BOTH parties, not just the republican majority. Since the democrats apparently opposed it, that super-majority was not met, thereby blocking the bill by the democrats' action.
The supermajority requirement actually enabled the minority party to stop the bill, rather than make it impossible.
I am obligated to respond... (Score:2, Insightful)
You must be new here.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:5, Insightful)
Bills have amendments for obvious reasons. If someone submits a bill and in the debate it is determined that there is a better way, the bill can be amended.
There's a few problems with "one and only agenda". First you have to have a defined agenda for the bill. Then you have to decide what falls in and what falls outside of that agenda. One important thing to remember is that it's impossible to amend a bill without the consent of the majority. You don't need a special rule to block 'riders', you just need Congresspeople who will vote against the amendments when they come up.
Re:mirror world? (Score:5, Insightful)
can someone explain?
Sure. In a nutshell, you've been lied to. I would never assert that the Republican party has always vote pro-Freedom (yeah, we wrote the Patriot Act. Sorry about that.), but censorship has often been a Democratic pastime. Remember, the DMCA was signed by a Democrat president, and the PMRC [wikipedia.org] was a pet project of Tipper Gore.
And yet, to hear liberal groups tell it, it's always the Evil Republicans (tm) who want to silence everyone. The truth is far more complex, but how often do you hear of both parties' sins?
P.S. I don't know which party Jack Thompson affiliates with. I won't blame either party for that nut.
Re:mirror world? (Score:3, Insightful)
The issue is that the bill would have allowed almost unlimited political spending on the Internet. The Republicans almost always have WAY more money than the Democrats, but how they can spend it is sharply constrained by campaign finance laws. The Democrats do not want to allow the Republicans to 'buy' the election by spending vast amounts of money on unregulated messages over the Internet.
Rep: "Pass this bill" so we can pay people to blog for us with no oversight.
Dem: "Stop this bill" or we will lose our asses in the next election.
It's not about free speech, really. It's about campaign finance and tactics.
IT'S NOT ABOUT PROTECTING FREE SPEECH (Score:5, Insightful)
The amendment would have created a loophole in campaign finance reform and allowed unlimited political spending on the web. The amendment would actually suppress free speech to the extent that independent views could be drowned out with politically financed astro-turfing.
In the fine tradition of many other laws and bills that have surfaced over the past five years, the intent of this amendment was the exact opposite of that implied by its title. If Orwell were alive, he'd be rolling in his grave.
Slashdot: faux infotainment for nerds.
Democrats and Campaign Reform... (Score:3, Insightful)
New campaign laws seek to limit the type/amout/method of information being disseminated in the weeks directly before election. Let me give an example...
Lets say a large group of bloggers decides they want to impact an election. 2 days before an election one anonymously blogs that Candidate X was accused of date rape in college and that the accuser is afraid to come forward. The day before the election, all of the other bloggers pick up the story and start talking about it in huge numbers. Then, the day of the election, every voter has to make a decision of risking to vote for a date rapist. I know this sounds silly, but it was a very effective strategy against a college student body president campaign at my alma mater only a few years back. A similar strategy was employed against a Republican candidate for house in 1996 in NC (although it wasnt bloggers, it was a mass mailing).
While there is no precedent against bloggers, it seems silly - I think - to give them a complete immunity when it is very possible (if not inevitable) that such an immunity would create a haven of this kind of attack.
The most important speech that must be protected is the vote.
Dems save /. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not sure the dems were ever friends of free spe (Score:5, Insightful)
And a Republican congress passed the law to begin with. Both major parties have similar agendas in this regard--most people, sadly, choose to ignore that fact and simply spout "my party is all that is good and light. Your party is teh suck" tripe.
Re:What a joke (Score:2, Insightful)
How clever of those Republicans... to secretly not want the bill passed, and make the Democrats do all the work and take the publicity hit of shooting it down...
Re:It's not just blogging! (Score:3, Insightful)
When you're watching television, and a political advertisement comes on, you did not opt into receiving that communication. You did not seek it out, you did not take the initiative to view it. The same is true of direct mail-- it came into your mailbox, and so you're going to at least give it a cursory look.
What makes those different than the so called "astroturfing" that is mentioned in the grandparent? Quite simply, it is that these are overt and obvious attempts by a campaign to sway your opinion. Astroturfing and blogs (at present) don't have the same kind of restrictions.
I'm not saying that J. Random Citizen's blog should say "Paid for by J. Random Citizen" at the bottom of each post, but if J. Random Citizen is, in fact, J. Random Campaign Employee, then it definately should make very clear that these views are being paid for by a campaign.
When Senator Kerry or President Bush's ads ran last year, we saw the "I'm John Kerry/George Bush and I approved this message" at the end.
Slap that kind of a regulation into place and then rewrite the law to indicate that only individuals not compensated by, or directly volunteering for a regulated political party/action committee/organization are exempt.
Otherwise, you're turning a decent law into a gaping loophole.
"Most liberal of parties" (Score:3, Insightful)
If this bill passed... (Score:5, Insightful)
Some PAC raises one million dollars from unlimited, unreported donations.
They use the money to pay 1000 bloggers to promote their issue.
They don't need to report that these bloggers work for them, or how much they get paid.
Rinse. Repeat.
Is this free speech?
Dems da feet (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's not just blogging! (Score:3, Insightful)
Neither party respects our liberties (Score:5, Insightful)
The reality is that neither party respects our liberties (i.e., fully embracing both the enumerated and unenumerated, and retained rights as outlined in the 10th Amendment of the Constitution). They tell us to look at the US Constitution and ask "where are you given that right?", rather than asking the question Madison would have, which is, "where did you give up that right?"
Both political parties have a shared monopoly on power (I think we called this a duopoly in Econ 101), and will resist any attempt to take away this power. Yes, they will jostle for advantage over one another, but when this duopoly is threatened they will unite against it (see, opposition to any redistricting reform by the mainstreams of both the Republican and Democratic parties in California).
Looking back at the 2004 election, the mainstream of the Democratic party was hit right between the eyes by the power of the Internet and Blogs, as demonstrated by the insurgent campaign of Howard Dean. The look at this and wonder what it might have been
Couple this with that there are still a few Republicans who value liberty (as understood through the lens of enumerated and unenumerated rights), over staying in power, and you see why this got fair broader support among them.
This isn't the first time something like this happened. Rewind back to the election of 1968, and TV was the breakout media. Eugene McCarthy used it effectively in New Hampshire to force Johnson from the primary process. Nixon and Wallace (running one of the most effective 3rd party campaigns since Teddy Roosevelt (even if I despise what he represented), used it to great benefit.
So, in the Congress following this election what happened? An incredible level of restrictions on TV in political campaigns were put into place, which effectively put access to TV in the hands of those in power.
Like McCain-Feingold (and I say this with the greatest respect for both of these gentleman), giving the FEC oversight of Bloggers will only diminish the level of free speech and dialog in the public square. The internet and blogs dramatically reduced the barriers to entry to commentators, because as A.J. Liebling noted, "Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one." All of a sudden, a whole lot of people now could own the equivalent of a printing press. And the result is as you would expect (applying Sturgeon's Law that 90% of everything is crap), with a lot of nonsenses and garbage spewing forth, but a few gems mixed up in the overall stream.
If I had my magic legislative wand, and could make one change to improve the political process in this country, I would wave it and do away with our FEC as it exists and our various restrictions on political spending and embracing Justice Brandise maxim, "sunlight is the best disinfectant; electric light the best policeman", I would require the following:
1. That within 24 hours of any political donation being made, that this fact be posted for all to see and search on the Internet. Any legislation in which this party has an interest will also be identified. If this donation was made by a PAC, then the membership of that PAC must be clearly visible (i.e. I can follow the money).
2. For scheduled meetings, 24 hours in advance, and for unscheduled meetings within 24 hours, any meeting with a lobbyist (defined as someone educating on an issue or requesting legislative action) will be disclosed for all to search on the Internet. The topic of this conversation will be disclosed along with any legislation discussed or related to the topic of conversation. The source of funding for this lobbyist, organization, or individual, must be made transparent, all the way back up the chain. If Lobbyist A was hired by Organization X who received funding from PACS 1, 2, and 3, who in turned received funding from PACS 4, 5, and 6, I should be able to follow it all the way back to the companies and individuals making the donations.
3. The calendar of all members of the Legislative and Executive branches, along with their staff members, will be made available and search-able on the Internet. Common, unique identifiers will be used to enable cross referencing.
Yours,
Jordan
Re:"Most liberal of parties" (Score:5, Insightful)
Myself, I vote for politicians (while holding my nose), not for parties.
This reminds me of the "motor-voter" debates (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to long ago, an idea was presented to link voter registration with getting your driver's license. The underlying idea, reportedly, was that, by making it easier for the average adult to register to vote, there would be a greater population of registered American voters thus making elections more reflective of "the will of the people".
Seems like a good idea really, but the debates on C-SPAN went a little differently
The Republicans were not happy and saying that this was just a ruse to get a disproportionate number of Democrats registered to vote. The implication is kind of interesting. Apparantly, Republicans (and likely Democrats) were of the opinion that persons of the GOP were more likely than Democrats to register without the assistance of the "motor-voter" legislation - at least that was my interpretation.
With the present situation, the implication seems to be that Republicans have more cash reserves than Democrats and, by making blogs not susceptible to campaign fund contribution limits, they can more easily use that advantage.
So, both sides seek to exploit a "hidden" advantage in a particular legislation. It's like the old saying, for every endeavor there is a "good reason" and the "real reason".
and the games go on
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
Why do people keep falling for political dog-and-pony shows like this? There are obvious reasons they voted against this, not because "Dems hate free speech!" crap. I'm absolutely sure that most people (Democrat, Republican, Green, Independent, etc.) would like to keep free speech, so just give that part a rest.
In a related question, when did people start believing that politicians were altruistic and truthful, and that being uncompromising was a sign of validity and truth?
"If, of the many truths, you select only one and follow it blindly, it will become a falsehood, and you a fanatic."
A truth unto itself, but don't follow it blindly ;)
Re:If this bill passed... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
The differences between parties are political philosophy, philosophy of government, and cultural identity. "Policy" is boring to most people, emotion sells. So if you can't or wont think on the level of policy, you are left with emotion. In this case, what you believe about which party is "freedom" oriented, against racism, kisses babies, "cares about regular people", defends the little guy, etc. etc. etc, is simply a matter of which side you listen to. The emotional messages of both parties are nearly the same, but most people listen to "their" party. It's sort of a tribal instinct.
Policy: The Republican party is stronger on allowing political free speech (this is why they are considered less politically correct, and why they oppose campaign finance reform, which is ultimately an attempt to regulate political speech.)
Policy: The Democratic party tends to favor "broadening" the definition of free speech to include things like controversial photographic materials, non-word-based self-expression (flag burning, certain kinds of disruptive protests), and other quasi-speech areas.
Don't get caught in the simple-sugars message of nice-people and selfish-people that both parties spin out for people who don't want to think things through. Rule of thumb: If it feels like an "iMac" commercial, it's empty propaganda. If it feels like a credit card bill, or a draft card, its reality.
Re:mirror world? (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember, the DMCA was signed by a Democrat president
And passed by a Republican majority congress. The sins of both parties are legion, and whenever someone comes around to challenge the status quo, left or right, they band together and squash the threat.
It is so funny to me to listen to the Democratic Party's newly found fondness of federalism, where for 40 years prior they treated support of states' rights and federalism as mere code words for supporting racism and segregation, and out of touch with core American values. Now that they're outnumbered at the federal level, they have all kinds of respect for checks and balances and fiscal responsibility.
Re:Uh, that was the WHOLE POINT (Score:4, Insightful)
No, it isn't. It's about exactly what it says it's about, which is exempting some opinionated dude in his pajamas from having to hire lawyers and accountants in order to exercise his first amendment right to free speech. The fact is that in the last election cycle the Dems got their asses handed to them due to their inability to uphold the status quo, which is (was) being able to rely on the main stream media to play the role of gatekeepers w/ regard to the message being put forth by a candidate or organization.
This isn't about trashing McCain Feingold, it's about preserving an idividual's freedom of speech within the political process. There is no difference between a blogger and some dude in a bar rattling on about politics.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
You took the words right out of my mouth. I thought the world was coming to an end when I saw something that wasn't Bush bashing on slashdot. Within the first few posts were people defending the democrats though. Doing that with the opposite spin gets an instant negative mod. Ironically...the modding down of someone with the opposite political belief is anti-free speech in itself. Readers need to hear both sides of a story. I just wish meta-modding worked. Biased negative mods always get an unfair from me no matter if it's left or right.
(posting anonymously because left will definitely mod this down).
Re:It's not just blogging! (Score:3, Insightful)
But we're not just talking about blogs and individual sites.
This bill would have made it perfectly legal for the Democratic party to buy every single ad space on CNN. Obviously this is an extreme case -- it would be too expensive and wouldn't return on the investment -- but it should illustrate the point that any regulation that affects print, television, etc. would have been circumvented simply by distributing something over the net. And we're moving toward distributing everything over the net.
Radio? Broadcast over the web instead of the air, and your restrictions are gone.
Newspapers? Switch from paper to the web. Same thing.
TV? We keep hearing about broadband becoming the new method of distribution, and we're starting to see it with ITMS.
Movies? Same as TV.
Phones? VOIP.
Think of anything that campaign finance laws limit. Now, pretend you want an IT patent and add the words "on the Internet."
Re:mirror world? (Score:3, Insightful)
It does when the one Democrat was on every TV and radio show to explain how censoring kids' music would make them happier, healthier, and safer. I'm pretty sure she invented the phrase "think of the children!".
Both sides of the aisle were in on this one, but Tipper was definitely the starring attraction.
Re:That's a lot of trouble to go to (Score:5, Insightful)
Somehow the parent was modded 'insightful'?
Ignorance has covered the land, eh whos suprised?
This bill in NO WAY will effect your ability to post whatever you want on your website, UNLESS you recieve money from somebody in a political party to post said content. You can post or publish ANYTHING you like, as long as you do it with your money. In no way would that restrain your ability to read other people who run, and edit THEIR OWN blogs. And then, EVEN IF these websites recieved such money, the only thing you would notice is the disclosure of WHO paid money.
For some reason, this is being posted with a title that disparages democrats, when in actuality they struck down a bill that would have made the funding source similar to CLOSED-SOURCE software, ie you cant look at it. Or by striking down this bill, the funding stream FOR EVERYONE has to BY LAW be disclosed just like everywhere else, ie OPEN-SOURCE. I mean isnt that the republican line on all this Patriot Act smoke and mirrors? The basic line of thinking, if you arent hiding anything in your funding sources, why wouldnt you want to disclose them? If you stopped listening to the rhetoric, you wouldnt get caught up in such inconsistancies of logic.
Stop being such an uninformed alarminst!
On a side note, I stopped having stories posted by 'Zonk' display on my slashdot homepage, because they were just garbage and it made me start to stay away from this site. The only way I noticed this article was by logging in on a computer that wasnt mine. It was amazing how much removing just that single editor made a difference in the percieved, and actual, quality of slashdot.
Re:mirror world? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:3, Insightful)
Good point. All restrictions on the abilities of the press to deliver information - regardless of medium - are patently unconstitutional and should be removed immediately.
How is this the Democrats fault? (Score:3, Insightful)
That aside, it's not clear to me that the rules are such a bad thing. They basically say that if a political party spends campaign money on the Web then it has to be reported - just as the case if said party spends money on TV ads. This is perfectly reasonable. Despite what some party-funded astroturfers would have you believe, this does NOT restrict J. Random Blogger from posting whatever he wants. It just says that if he gets money from the RNC, the RNC has to report it.
Re:What a joke (Score:3, Insightful)
Suspension Calendar is designed for bills that will have little to no objection, hence the limited debate and restriction on amendments. The two bills that passed are bills that the Suspension Calendar was designed for. Why the GOP chose Suspension Calendar for a bill that would obviously raise objections, I don't know, but thanks for helping me make my point.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
2) The reason the summary sticks out like a sore thumb is because it is so obvious that it is hiding an essential fact about the article. If someone posted an article stating that the Republican party was trying to create a tax system with 25 brackets, someone here would nail that too.
Re:Uh, that was the WHOLE POINT (Score:5, Insightful)
That's too bad, because the more I look at it, the more convinced I become that it's not possible to preserve an individual's freedom of speech without first trashing McCain/Feingold.
Upholding Campaign Finance law was the second-biggest mistake of the Supreme Court in the last ten years. The first, obviously, was their brain-dead Emminent Domain ruling. Why is it that the so-called "progressives" in American politics seem to be the ones in the biggest hurry to take my rights away?
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
Are you feigning surprise? The comparison to Cuba is especially obvious. The way things are going, you can expect to be mentioned in the same breath with Zimbabwe, Iran, Libya, North Korea, and Syria.
Try not to be surprised.
Re:It's not just blogging! (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, not even Fox? (Score:3, Insightful)
Many on the far right would claim that fox's slogan is in fact a play on the rest of media claiming it is fair and balanced, while in fact biased to the left. (Witness CBS releasing and standing by fake documents in the last election)
These are the same people who will call Fox mid left, and everyone else extreme left. That most of Europe would consider the US media mid right is not important to them.
Slashdotters conspiracy search (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:2, Insightful)
I think your point is well intentioned, but there are a few difference between what's shown on TV and what's available on the internet:
1. Most TV news is available over public airwaves, web content is available at privately owned websites. If Bob, Fox News, or MoveOn.org want to put up something on their own website, what's the federal government's interest in regulating that?
2. Watching campaign ads via television is a pretty passive experience. I'm watching a show, and suddenly I'm unexpectedly watching a commercial about how Senator So-And-So eats babies and burns down orphanages. That's fine, comes with the territory, but it's not like I asked to be shown a political ad. On the internet, however, if I'm reading a story about Senator So-And-So's views on an issue, it's really likely that I went looking for that information on my own.
In my experience, it's always a good idea to err on the side of more free speech rather than less. While reducing the ability of rich parties and rich people to unduly influence elections is a noble goal, campaign finance reform has been a real mixed bag vis-a-vis free speech. Maybe you can make the case for regulating political speech on television (equal time, etc.), but regulating it on the internet is asinine.
If the GOP/Dems want to prop up a bunch of phony blogs touting how great their platforms are, let them live and die based on the strength of their arguments. People will continue to read the blogs they've come to know and trust. Do you read spam blogs now? If not, why would you read a hollow party-machine political blog in the future? And if (by some minor miracle) one of these big-money blogs makes a valid, interesting point, how has that adversely impacted the free exchange of ideas?
Let anyone put up whatever website they want. We can think for ourselves.
Re:What a joke (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Uh, that was the WHOLE POINT (Score:5, Insightful)
Media favor is probably the most important factor in elections... money is important because it can influence media favor to some degree.
Re:Slashdotters conspiracy search (Score:2, Insightful)
Clinton cheated on his wife, and was beaten to a pulp publicity wise. Even when most polls showed that a large percentage of american didn't care, it still went on.
Bush lied to get us to war, Haliburton id getting no bid contracts, etc ad nauseum. he hasn't gotten half the negative press Clinton did.
I find that the media is a lot closer to center, and all arguements I have heard otherwise have just been strawmen.
AS far as this issue goes, it is very completcated. AS we all know, they can't enforce this accross the board and go after every offended. What they can do, is shut down the occasional site for violating these rules. They do exist for a reason.
Re:Lovely Omission (Score:1, Insightful)
Bullshit. First, if you're thinking the unwashed, stupid, naive, and influenced need protection, or shouldn't have as much of a say as you (aka fascism). That's normally the line of some hypocritical conservative, not a liberal.
Paid advertising to me is not mind control. It's information. I can edit out ads on recordings (usually legal except DMCA issues), change the channel or tune out, get up to get a snack or go to the bathroom, etc. If I get a negative ad, I do research to see if any facts have been distorted, who the organization (e.g. moveon.org) is that supported it and which candidate they are backing, etc.
Second, I would even dare say that many of these "mind control" ads did the exact opposite they were intended to do, which is great evidence that they are NOT mind control. Moveon.org ads pissed off a lot of conservatives, so much so that a lot got off their asses and voted FOR George W.
Re:That's why it should have passed (Score:3, Insightful)
ifwm said:
I am glad we are now talking about campaign finance and not "the Democrats are stealing our fr33doms!!1".
You are certainly entitled to your opinion that limiting campaign spending and contributions results in limiting free speech. Unfortunately for you, the majority of the American people, the Congress, and the Supreme Court have consistently disagreed with you.
Let's look at why this might be. If there was no limit or regulation of campaign finance then there is no question that the voice of the rich and powerful would increase. It is generally assumed that the increased voice of the rich and powerful comes at the cost of decreasing the voice of everyone else. In fact, without regulation, the voice of the rich and powerful can come disguised as the voice of the common person.
If the bill had passed, there is no question that the Internet would be flooded with soft campaign money. It could easily drown out the voices of individuals. Just as your freedom to move your arm and fist stops at my nose, your freedom of speech stops when it is so loud and pervasive that it drowns out the free speech of others.
Yes bloggers on both sides supported (Score:3, Insightful)
Which makes it even more rediculous the Democrats by and large sunk it! Take a look at the list of people voting against, hardly any were Republicans.
This bill being killed was all about the people not in power disliking the freedom blogs had to say what they wished, the freedom of blogs on thier own side be damned. Perhaps the Republicans would have acted the same in the same position, but all we know for sure is that the Democrats DID kill this bill. The people of the U.S. who are members of the Democratic (and Republican for those few cases) parties need to REMEMBER the votes on this bill come primary and election time.
It really is as simple as it looks this time.