Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Maybe they can finally see what WE see

I came across this little nugget in my daily jaunt around the 'toobz.

The writer of this local Connecticut blog, Right Thoughts, has a little problem with "centrist" John McCain's latest plunge into legislative fuck-it-uppitry.

It's encouraging to see more and more conservative bloggers start to realize that the extreme-right's Kool-Aid actually tastes like rancid dog piss; and maybe it's time to spit it out and rinse their mouths with a cool, refreshing splash of Progressive ideology.

Then again, this might simply be a personal issue with the Right Thoughts blogmeister. In the very next post, he discusses how wonderful it is to view the NSFW image linked from his article about a naked female TV Sci-Fi character.

I guess McCain's proposed anti-anything-obscene, not-just-kiddie-porn legislation hits a little too close to home.

Hmmm...that brings this to mind: maybe if HE was scheduled to be one of those lucky 30,000 troops who he discussed in a preceeding article that are going to be the salvation of Iraq, he might have a differing point of view on that, too.

It always seems to boil down to simple self-interest with these neo-cons.
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Ladies and gentlemen - Why I think John McCain is a low-life scumbag with no regard for your rights


As if this idiot hadn’t already tanked his aspirations for the Presidency, along comes his latest assault on the Internet.

Millions of commercial Web sites and personal blogs would be required to report illegal images or videos posted by their users or pay fines of up to $300,000, if a new proposal in the U.S. Senate came into law.

The legislation, drafted by Sen. John McCain and obtained by CNET News.com, would also require Web sites that offer user profiles to delete pages posted by sex offenders.

In a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday, the Arizona Republican and former presidential candidate warned that “technology has contributed to the greater distribution and availability, and, some believe, desire for child pornography.” McCain scored 31 of 100 points on a News.com 2006 election guide scoring technology-related votes.

After child pornography or some forms of “obscenity” are found and reported, the Web site must retain any “information relating to the facts or circumstances” of the incident for at least six months. Webmasters would be immune from civil and criminal liability if they followed the specified procedures exactly.

McCain’s proposal, called the “Stop the Online Exploitation of Our Children Act” (click for PDF), requires that reports be submitted to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which in turn will forward them to the relevant police agency. (The organization received $32.6 million in tax dollars in 2005, according to its financial disclosure documents.)

Internet service providers already must follow those reporting requirements. But McCain’s proposal is liable to be controversial because it levies the same regulatory scheme--and even stiffer penalties--on even individual bloggers who offer discussion areas on their Web sites.

“But he’s a maverick!”

Fuck you. He’s a shill and an overly-ambitious corporate whore just like the rest of them, and to make matters worse he’s an enemy of the First Amendment.

“How can you say that? He’s just trying to fight kiddie porn!”

Oh fuck you. Stop using children as a shield for your power grabs. This won’t protect any victims of child pornography. It will only create a new class of criminals out of regular, law-abiding people, their only crime being that they provided a discussion area on a website and a place for users to create a profile. It’s back-door regulation of online speech is all it is.

“Look, all you have to do is watch out for kiddie porn links!”

Listen, asshole - The law is impractical at best. It’s not possible for me to trace and track every link in every profile on the sites I host and I get like, little-to-moderate traffic. Plus, let’s take Lee’s site for example. Who’s responsible? Me? My name is on the lease for the server but i don’t run that site, I only maintain the technology.

Would Senator McCain hold me legally liable if Lee forgot to police a single URL in a single member profile? What happens if a sex offender posts to my site and I don’t have any way of knowing that person is a sex offender? Not all states have a database online that I can search - and of course how the fuckam I supposed to do anything else except watch and track and search registries all goddamned day?

There would be no time to actually create content - which may be McCain’s ultimate goal. He seems to have a passionate hatred for speech online.

On top of all that - and perhaps most importantly - to actually police the sites, I have to FOLLOW EVERY LINK, AND THAT MAKES ME GUILTY OF POSSESSION OF KIDDIE PORN IF ONE OF THEM HAPPENS TO BE ILLEGAL! John McCain is actually proposing a law that forces me to potentially become a child pornographer!

Jesus. Horatio. Caine.  What the FUCK is wrong with him?
According to the proposed legislation, these types of individuals or businesses would be required to file reports: any Web site with a message board; any chat room; any social-networking site; any e-mail service; any instant-messaging service; any Internet content hosting service; any domain name registration service; any Internet search service; any electronic communication service; and any image or video-sharing service.
Well golly gee, Mr. Senator - I happen to be two, possibly three of those. Great. Just dandy.

This is well beyond protecting children. This is an egregious violation of the Constitution and of common sense. John McCain doesn’t deserve to be a dog catcher much less a Senator. Remember that when the race for 2008 gets underway.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

off topic, but whats up with our senators meeting with assad?

Anonymous said...

on topic, is this an actual plan or just a "first step"?

Connecticut Man1 said...

This is about shutting all of the little guys out of the Blogosphere, and making it next to impossible for the BIG Blogs to let everyone participate.

Nevermind the big question:
How the hell do they stop this in other countries? They can't enforce this unless they cut the American internet off from the rest of the world.

McCain has completely lost his mind and you have just witnessed a very public political suicide.

Mikefromvernon said...

Gee, Bob, don't hold back. Tell us how you really feel.

Anonymous said...

"It's encouraging to see more and more conservative bloggers start to realize that the extreme-right's Kool-Aid actually tastes like rancid dog piss; and maybe it's time to spit it out and rinse their mouths with a cool, refreshing splash of Progressive ideology."

Poetically put, Bob. I've never tried, but I think I'd have an easier time swallowing rancid dog piss than swallowing Republican talking points.

My guess is McCain has internal polling showing Brownback pulling ahead of him in the Bible-Beater Republican primary demographic. Having kissed more of Bush's butt than even Joe Lieberman, McCain is desperate to see his investment pay off with the Republican nomination. I'm afraid we can expect much more right wing lunacy from McCain over the next eighteen months or so.

CT Bob said...

mikefromvernon - I'm not sure you're aware that everything written BELOW McCain's picture was from the blog I quoted; compared to his rant, I was kind of easy.

anonymous - yes, I'm a poet at heart. I certainly enjoy booze enough to qualify; the good thing is, my writing doesn't suffer from it. I'm as awful sober as I am pissed!

McCain lost what little leeway I offered him when he voted FOR the torture bill in exchange for Bush's help in his run for the '08 election. That proved to me he's nothing but an ambitious politician who would sell his dearest held beliefs for a shot at the Oval Office. He deserves to get beaten, badly.