Election Commission Takes a Light Touch With Net Regs 102
CNet is reporting that the Federal Election Commission released a 96-page volume of internet regulations last Friday. From the article: "The rules [PDF] say that paid Web advertising, including banner ads and sponsored links on search engines, will be regulated like political advertising in other types of media. They also say bloggers can enjoy the freedoms of traditional news organizations when endorsing a candidate or engaging in political speech.
How nice of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
Aren't we lucky, they're so gracious as to allow us our constitutionally protected free speech. Like they had a choice.
Re: Their First Banner Ad (Score:3, Insightful)
s/sponsored/decided/
Light touch? (Score:2, Insightful)
"Light" touch?? (Score:2, Insightful)
How about a lighter touch: the US Constitution is about 6 pages.
Or, gosh golly & gee wiz, how about an even lighter touch than that? The first amendment is 45 words
Or how about: HANDS OFF THE INTERNET YOU ASSHATS!
Yeah, I think that sounds better
Re:Their First Banner Ad (Score:3, Insightful)
I thought it was funny and the little bit of an edge added to the sarcasm. Some of the folks who get their mod points take themselves waaayyy too seriously. What's the point in modding someone down? They'll just get lost in the noise if nobody mods them up. And in the meantime, there's one less mod point for folks who say something really interesting or insightful who do get lost in the noise because some mod had to use their points to mod someone down that they disagreed with. I very rarely see someone modderated as "Flamebait" or "Troll" who really deserve it. And most of the time, folks who start their posts with "You're stupid..", "You're an idiot.." or something that I considered to be rude and "Flamebait" get modded insightful.
Re:The only sane alternative (Score:2, Insightful)
Wow
Hey, if you don't want to listen to someone who may have been payed by "Big Politics", then perchance why don't you do something about it, like ask the journalists to affirm or deny they are being paid by politicians for their stories? You can challenge them to go on record. You could even get them to do this contractually, if you wanted to. (Via subscription, since you're paying them money, you could then file a class action against them for violating their agreed upon terms of contract
It's called "taking responsibility". But you'd rather try to take the easy way out (by creating or supporting the creation of) laws which will "do the job" - which they never do. Why? Because it never CAN do it. One may as well write a law suspending gravity. Or try to keep water from flowing back to the oceans. Money will enter politics because money and politics share so much in common - power. Do you think that *maybe* instead of making the government BIGGER (giving it more power), the solution is to make it smaller - so it has less power? And less draw for the power mad troglodytes who infest Congress (and the other two branches)? But as long as it is beneficial to spend millions for a Congressional seat, those millions WILL be spent.
Re:How nice of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
But by "giving" us the right, they reserve their right to take it away in the future, if the right is "abused". So they have set a precident that may come in handy in the future, as long as those nasty courts don't interfere.
Fortunately for them, by the time a court interferes, the election would likely be over, rendering the point moot for that election season, and giving them the opportunity to create a differently worded "right of speach". Rinse, repeat.
Re:Light touch? (Score:3, Insightful)
To me, the biggest fear is that they HAD to clarify this. Publishing on the internet should be regarded exactly the same as publishing flyers, TV ads, books, etc. WITHOUT clarification. The job of determining this has traditionally been left to the courts anyway.
Anytime the government decides to regulate speach, you are entering very dangerous waters. This included McCain-Feingold or any other law that puts any limitation on political speech.
Some of us believe that campaign contributions should be 100% without limits, but 100% reported and accounted for so the public can see exactly who is buying and selling our politicians.
Re:The only sane alternative (Score:2, Insightful)
In contrast to the current situation where newspapers can spend whatever they want on slanted news and opinions, the bloggers are limited to $5000. Sorry, this is not an even playing field.
Since reading bloggers is a totally user driven experience, compared to adds on TV or even print, there is no reason for any limits.
The USA has a tradition of anonymous political speech, starting with the founders. Both print and broadcast media have bandwidth limits; with enough money you can saturate the channel. That's not true of blogging.
Re:How nice of them. (Score:4, Insightful)
Constitutionally protected? If that is the case your freedom comes from the gracious allowance of that document. My liberty (of speech and action) comes standard with my humanity. I don't need a 200-year-old paper to grant it to me. The only trouble is that I live under a government and in a society that will do things I do not desire if I say or do certain things; I modify my behavior accordingly.
We would have been better off without a Bill of Rights. Since the first ten amendments are enumerations of things government CAN NOT do, government has plausible (but still wrong) ground to assume there are other powers it can take on because nothing says it can't. The Constitution was better as a document enumerating the things government CAN do, with the assumption being that all other powers are strictly excluded.
In essence, our precious bill of rights has doomed us to totalitarianism. The Constitution may have slowed the process, but that's where we're headed anyway.
Nevertheless, I do agree with you. It's ridiculous for anyone to say they "allowed" anyone to say anything on the Internet. I could just as easily say that I allow the sun to rise.
Re:How nice of them. (Score:3, Insightful)
Jefferson would be ashamed. Even -with- the bill of rights, these freedoms are being chipped away at by government in only half the time he predicted...
Full disclosure (Score:3, Insightful)
The cure for free speech is more speech.
Re:How nice of them. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yep. And that's why anytime a judge rules on the basis of "privacy" or "fair use" or anything that the founding fathers may have intended, but have not directly spelled out, he is denounced as an activist judge.
"can enjoy the freedoms" (Score:3, Insightful)
These laws and these regulations are so counter-freedom that it amazes me that people don't READ THE LAWS and see how attrocious they are. McCain-Feingold should be renamed "The Incumbent Protection Act" -- read it carefully and you'll see that it was written to kill the Greens and the Libertarians and any other 3rd party by reducing their ability to gain financing from a few campaign donors.
The problem with elections is not money, not corporations, not anything that the politicians say it is. The problem with elections is that the seat one is trying to win has too much power. If you want to fix elections, fix the political seat -- reduce the power of government to where it should be under the Constitution. When the power is reduced, no amount of money will create protectionism, favoritism and cronyism.
I don't want to be able to enjoy the freedoms because government says I "can." I want to use my freedoms to never worry that government might tell me how narrow those freedoms are becoming.
Re:Light touch? (Score:2, Insightful)
spending 5 million selling people you think they should vote for $candidate = first amendment
So, what you're saying is: first amendment=bad and should be regulated. Don't sweat it. Lots of people believe that [winonadailynews.com].
checks and balances (Score:5, Insightful)
The SCOTUS isn't there to punish unconstitutional policy, just block it. Accountability should come only through elections. If we equated getting overruled by the courts with treason, that would destroy the system of checks and balances by elevating the courts to a position similar to the Iranian "Council of Guardians." There's simply no way such a system wouldn't be abused: imagine what a court stuffed with Republican appointees would do to a Democrat president, or vice versa.
Ironic how your post about respecting the Constitution reveals a very basic incomprehension about how the system created by that Constitution actually works.
Re:checks and balances (Score:3, Insightful)