Political Bloggers May Be Forced to Register 658
Thebes writes "Under Senate Bill S.1, political bloggers with a readership of over 500 who comment on policy matters or hope to incite 'grassroots' action amongst their readers would be forced to register with the Federal Government as lobbyists."
We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh. I thought it was only the Republicans who were after our 1st Amendment rights. But here are the Democrats [loc.gov] assaulting our freedoms again [slashdot.org] by trying to control who says what [cbn.com].
<sarcasm>Oh, never mind, they just want to make sure we have "our papers in order" before we can criticize them.</sarcasm> And we thought that they would be for our rights. But it looks like they are just interested in using the power to stay in power.
It's time to lose the naivte and realize that politicians (whether Republicans or Democrats) are only interested in one thing--getting re-elected.
Free speech anyone? (Score:3, Insightful)
After McCain-Feingold, what could you expect...... (Score:4, Insightful)
The one upside to the US is that the process is documented and public *as* *it* *happens*.
I would encourage all
Unbelieveably unconstitutional! (Score:4, Insightful)
Each of my blogs (Score:4, Insightful)
But if one of my blogs did indeed gain an extra reader, how would they ever know?
FUD (Score:3, Insightful)
The bill just redefines what it means to be a lobbyist, and seeing as this comes from a grassroots lobbyist, I would argue that this exact article is exactly the type of lybbying the Senate wishes to be kept informed of.
Dear Senators: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Free speech anyone? (Score:3, Insightful)
Web hosts aren't going to do it.
ISP's aren't going to do it.
If the heat gets turn up for the above to police it, this registration will die.
Do editorial columnists in Newspapers... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Free speech anyone? (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyway, this is the attitude that's letting these things pass...
Re:FUD (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
So if I use ads and merchandise to support my site and try to make something of a living off of my writing I have to register as a lobbyist? Then why shouldn't news anchors/columnists have to do the same? One of the things that (supposedly) led to the American Revolution was the stamp tax. Any attempt to restrict the free press is bad, no matter the consequences. And nothing is more "free press" than a private citizen deciding to write down their thoughts and distribute them to people, for profit or otherwise.
500 what? (Score:4, Insightful)
Free speech is one of the most important rights we have; why is the government so keen on regulating it? You can't regulate a right, it is a right. I can understand regulating the lobbyists for organizations, corporations, and interest groups--groups are not citizens. But individuals who ARE citizens have inalienable rights. A hearty "Fuck Off!" to those who seek to "regulate" individual rights.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
It's time to lose the naivte and realize that politicians (whether Republicans or Democrats) are only interested in one thing--getting re-elected.
Generalizations are rarely a good approach to take. There are a lot of shady, unscrupulous politicians. There are also good ones who try and do the best they can in what are usually difficult jobs.
By dismissing every elected official in the country you basically make it harder to get good ones in office.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
We really went wrong when we (or the SCOTUS, really) decided that corporations had "rights" just as if they were real people. Really big, rich, immortal people. Most of our campaign finance problems could be curbed if we overturned that finding. Make the government accountable to natural persons only. Sure, the rich would still have an advantage over the poor, but at least we'd control the inhuman sociopaths that we call corporations.
Re:Google/banner ads (Score:5, Insightful)
You bet. I also realize that many of them like doughnuts, have siblings, and read books. Further, I concede that they often have heartfelt opinions about matters of punctuation and some (but not all) of them did well in algebra.
But most importantly, I can recognize a straw man from a kilometer away. Bloggers taking advertising doesn't mean that their advertisers are paying them to influence public opinion, anymore than the lawyer whose face is plastered all over the city buses around here is paying people to use public transportation.
Nice try though.
--MarkusQ
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:4, Insightful)
Just imagine that first article written in the New York Times that mentions a blogger with a small letter note beside the name saying Registered Lobbyist #958970. Good-bye reputation...
Or the first unregistered blogger who says something the government really doesn't like...fines, jail time, mandatory censorship? After all, they broke laws that lobbyists must conform to. This is a simple and systematic way to quiet down the people that aren't under control.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And they call themself a fucking democracy! (Score:3, Insightful)
And that the Democrats proposed the bill?
And that GWB didn't propose the bill?
But what the hey, it seems like a good enough reason to impeach him. What I'm more confused about is your mention of the "return of fascism." I must have missed the good ol' fascist days here in the US.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Who wrote Section 220 of the legislation? (Score:3, Insightful)
Cosponsored by: Bennett(R), Brown(D), Cantwell(D), Collins(R), Durbin(D), Feinstein(D), Lautenburg(D), Leahy(D), Liberman(I), Lott(R), McConnell(R), Menendez(D), McKulski(D), Salazar(D), Schumer(D), Stabenow(D), Webb(D). 17 cosponsors so far.
For those who didn't become politically aware until after the republicans gained power in 1994 and thought the democrats actually practiced what they preach about the First Amendment, I welcome you to reality. The Democrats will tell you anything you want to hear to achieve power just like the Republicans do. The only way to fix it is to scale the federal government back to its Constitutional powers and you can be damn sure that they will do anything they can to stop that from happening.
Re:Read the bill, not the article (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:4, Insightful)
Another reason to NOT vote Democrat (Score:2, Insightful)
I know you are being sarcastic, but a lot of "Republicans" do want your 1st Amendment Rights. Almost no Conservatives do though. But RINOs like John McCain are happy to join forces with almost every single Democrat to shut down the 1st. Other RINOs like Rudy want to join forces with Democrats to eliminate the 2nd. But make no mistake, while you can almost always find a RINO to agree with any limitation of essential liberties, the bulk of the votes will come from Democrats. Hell, the Civil Rights act was passed over the opposition (including, I do seem to recall, a filibuster assisted in by none other than the current #3 in the chain of succession) of Democrats.
You think I'm being overly partisan, just slagging Democrats? Consider this then: They get back from the wilderness after a twelve year period out of power and look at the first thing out of the chute? This is Senate Bill #1. I.e. the very first thing they proposed after getting control over the agenda. Combine with the story on
Listen up folks, this is the big fight. None of the rest matters if we can't get the 1st Amendment back. McCain/Feingold already damned near voided it, this will finish the job. If we can't peacefully assemble (in places like blogs for example) and petition our government (i.e. lobby) for redress of our legitimate greivences then the only option left will be messy.
Reasonable people can argue whether the 1st Amendment protects some things, but if it doesn't protect political speech during an election season what the hell is it good for anyway? What sort of diseased mind can claim that the 1st protects porn but supports outlawing buying a billboard to support/oppose a candidate for political office?
Actually, strictly speaking, he's right (Score:5, Insightful)
What about newspapers and magazines? (Score:1, Insightful)
They all, from time to time, write political articles. Some have a deliberately partisan approach.
They all have a readership of greater than 500 (Hell, even my local church newsletter that comes through my door 3 times a year does).
Therefore they should all register as lobbyists.
What a piece of garbage piece of legislation.
Stephen
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
If you are being paid to advertise a position, it was never free(libre) speech in the first place. It's commercial speech and has been regulated for centuries. You can't advertise Twinkies as a cure for cancer if you make money selling Twinkies, and society is far better off for having restricted such fraudulent or deceptive speech.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
I certainly don't agree with it - just like I don't agree that protesters have to register at City Hall or whereever in many places beforehand, or the infamous "Free Speech" zones. I don't like lobbyists, but I don't think registration is necessary unless they donate to politicians. Let the media/internet/investigators decide their vested interests.
It's only being bought to people's attention because the government is intruding on the internet - not because we think it's all right in the real word but fundamentally different on the internet. It's not a good standalone argument to say "it's was all right all this time in the real world, why not the internet?" if:
a) the audience did not realize the situation in the realworld due to ignorance (being outside their sphere of knowledge)
b) assuming the audience agreed with how it is done in the realworld.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:2, Insightful)
You're second point... that 1 out of 10 Americans is going to pick up a gun and fight the government... Are you high, stupid, or both? Most Americans don't care what is really going on in the country, as long as they can turn on "American Idol" or "Deal or No Deal". You might, possibly, get 1 out of 1000 willing to pick up a gun and lose their life in the process if the government tried to do something drastic, like take ALL guns. But I doubt the numbers would be even that high. There was barely any protests when GWB was caught spying on citizens. It'd take something insanely nuts to get people up in arms.
Finally, I'll end with this. America has problems in Iraq not because of the guns (most of which we gave) to the Iraqi people, but because the military today is full of people whose last chance is joining up. We've lowered standards and requirements to the point where if you can't get into college and can't get a decent job and have lots of debt, well, what the hell... join the Army! We sent people to Iraq who probably mostly can't locate it on a map, certainly don't speak the language, but expect them to patrol and act like Police officers. We'd be crazy to expect anything different from what's happening. We terrorize and demoralize the people there and they fight back, again, I ask are you high or stupid or both. Would you expect different?
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact remains that no matter how many guns you can get your hands on there is always one group who will have more. They are the various law enforcement organisations of the US (or any other country for that matter). You think owning a firearm of any kind will do you any good if the government decided to get rid of you?
Whether you agree with the pro-gun lobby or not the fact remains that if you were a threat to the government and they found out, the special forces they sent in could brush you aside without the slightest amount of trouble. They are better trained than you could hope to be (while trying to hold down a full time job anyway) and better equiped. They also have infintely more experience at killing people.
Now I am sure a great many soldiers would never dream of harming their own citizens. However I bet there are some that would follow any order they were given. The germans circa 1940 were not some alternate race of people bred for evil, they were just human beings like you and me, yet some of them ended up gaurding concentration camps that most of the population never knew existed.
I would also bet that with all the psychological tests soldiers are put through any decent comanding officer will have a pretty good idea who would follow his orders even if they knew them to be dubious.
So with all this in mind how much protection does that gun you keep under your pillow protect you? And even more so if the government force you to keep it locked away on the other side of the room lest your kids get at it. They could just grab you off the street and there are very few states nowadays that allow the carrying of a concealed firearm in public.
The biggest thing protecting us from all these things is not guns, but other people and how they would react to seeing people disappear. How they would tell other people and word would spread. Some may even write about this on the internet letting the whole world know what was going on and it would be very difficult to stop them unless you knew who they were ahead of time and could silence them in the first wave.
The first thing you do when seizing control of a country is quietly sieze control of the media without the populace knowing. But if the media are the people the people that becomes alot more difficult, especially if they can blog with relative anonmity using a few tools. I would hope that a great many readers of slashdot could do a pretty good job of posting to the net while hiding their identity, and not just by posting as AC. But if you can make anonymously blogging about the government a crime in itself then you make things a little easier.
Remember - Knowledge is power.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not saying that target practice is wrong, I'm saying that not everyone needs to do it. Fine, if people want to make a sport of it, then give them guns with serial numbers and low powered bullets that are tagged.
Lets start off.... (Score:3, Insightful)
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Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
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Where in this statement does it say that political or corporate statements should be regulated by any law? Speech is done by people, even if paid by someone else. Why is there a standard of "who can say what" when it concerns corporate speech and political speech?
Now, repercussions can result from said speech, and that is a separate issue (libel, slander, threatening...).
Re:Do editorial columnists in Newspapers... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
restricting the right of a person to, for any reason, address the public regarding an issue is extremely dangerous territory.
some jackass astroturfing political issues doesn't present a clear and present danger and so it should not be restricted.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, it seems to do exactly that. Worst crime rate in the US, just about? Washington DC. No guns allowed. So - just like the saying goes - only criminals have guns among the general population, giving them a decided advantage. Areas where almost everyone has firearms... almost no crime.
The fact is, if a criminal thinks I may - or probably do - have a gun - that criminal is not going to try to mug me. If they're pretty certain I'm unarmed; they will.
It is very unfortunate that you gun-fearing types can neither understand simple statistics or think the issue through to its logical conclusion. Scared of guns? Fine. But don't try to transfer your fears to the rest of the population. You just make the place less safe for everyone else. In other words, you're screwing things up. More. Please stop.
False Alarm! Bloggers are not covered (Score:3, Insightful)
Democracy 21 has the correct facts. Bloggers are fine, unless they are paid astroturf shills:
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
So now is entirely appropriate to question the invasion. It's not unpatriotic at all.
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the same as re-branding people against the invasion of Iraq as unpatriotic.
Not to pick nits, but if you don't support your nation during time of war, then, yes, you are unpatriotic.
It's the utmost of patriotism to protest the policies of the government.
FalconRe:Do editorial columnists in Newspapers... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We just want to see zee papers (Score:3, Insightful)
No, a gun is a device designed to launch a high velocity projectile in a relatively flat trajectory, by definition. The intent behind the usage of this device is always determined by the operator.
Another reason to ignore slashdotters (Score:2, Insightful)
According to your logic, the entire Bush administration and every congressperson and senator who supported them are RINOs. That would be roughly the entire Republican party. Don't even try to use the "Democrats made me do it" argument either. Republicans had control for a solid four years, and those were the worst four years the first and fourth amendments have ever seen. Yeah, the state of free speech is pretty grim in this country right now, but your "conservatives" are way too preoccupied with attacking abortion and homosexuality to care about free speech. That's just liberal intellectual elite stuff, remember? True patriots are supposed to go along with whatever the President says, remember? If you question the government the terrorists win, remember? We need to use government resources to spy on anti-war groups, remember? If all of that is okay then why is the sky falling as soon as some questionable language gets into a bipartisan bill?