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The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

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Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#51

Post by patrickgzill »

plusbryan wrote: post #28
jws wrote: post #11

The bill in question is COICA – "Combating Online Infringements and Counterfeits Act" EFF has this to say: The main mechanism of the bill is to interfere with the Internet's domain name system (DNS), which translates names like "www.eff.org" or "www.nytimes.com" into the IP addresses that computers use to communicate. The bill creates a blacklist of censored domains; the Attorney General can ask a court to place any…

I'm shocked and ashamed that California's own Feinstein appears on this list.

Maybe you should read up on her, including who her husband has been since 1980. Perhaps then you would be less shocked - hint: hubby does not divide his time between helping widows and orphans, and petting puppies and kittens...

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#52

Post by DanielBMarkham »

jparise wrote: post #38
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #37

Very interesting. Wonder what all of these senators have in common? It doesn't look like party, section of the country, or left-right leanings. Usually when you get a wide dispersed group like this, the next thing to do is look for businesses and organizations (either inside the senator's state or not) that use money and votes to heavily lobby. Wonder who would lobby for this? Just thinking aloud. I don't mean this t…

They are the current members of the Senate Judiciary Committee: http://judiciary.senate.gov/about/members.cfm They don't really have anything else in common other than their committee membership.

Got it. I missed the judiciary tie-in.

Then I think a much better headline would be "Senate Judiciary Committee Unanimously Votes In Favor Of Internet Censorship Bill" since the unanimous nature of the vote is the real story here.

Very strange that there were no dissenters. Anybody have a line into what sort of testimony the committee heard? Either an extremely persuasive case was made or there is some other part of this story that we are missing.

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#53

Post by 1337p337 »

noarchy wrote: post #29
Towle_ wrote: post #25

Extra Credit: Why aren't the senators' party affiliations listed?

Because it doesn't matter. Quite often, those parties are two sides of the same coin. If they didn't list party affiliation on ballots, people would instead vote based on what? The names they like most? That's about how informed some voters are, unfortunately. It takes effort to get informed, and the entities that should inform them, often fail to do so.

(D)s, (R)s, and other letters in parentheses next to names are the sort of things that influence how people vote, and in articles like this, they affect future votes.

That said, it is somewhat sad that the informed citizen is a more rare voter than they used to be. The ballot in my state was so long that I had to make a cheat sheet to avoid having to memorize all of the names. I suspect that for non-partisan offices, a lot of people did just vote for names they like. If elections weren't so costly, it might be objectively better to hold local, state, and federal elections on different days, so that people who show up to vote for a president or a governor don't just mark the rest of their ballot without knowing who they're voting for.

These are all senators, though, so it can be assumed that they were mostly elected by people who at least had heard of them.

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#54

Post by MBlume »

snsr wrote: post #43
MBlume wrote: post #9

California senator Dianne Feinstein, who appears on this list, also sponsored Consume But Don't Try Programming ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Broadband_and_Digital_... ) back in the day. As long as she's on the ballot, I'll be voting for her Republican opponent, however loathsome.

My god that has to be one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. Seems Leahy was at the helm of that disaster, too.

Actually, Leahy killed CBDTP:

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had stated that he could "not support" the proposed legislation and, as chairman, intended to block consideration of the controversial bill. This essentially killed the bill in 2002.

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#55

Post by natmaster »

I honestly do not understand people who cite the first amendment to the constitution as reasoning, but think the second amendment is antiquated.

(Note: They don't mention the second amendment in this article, I'm merely referring to the fact that I don't hear uproars like this when it is violated.)

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#56

Post by _delirium »

joeybaker wrote: post #41
plusbryan wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm shocked and ashamed that California's own Feinstein appears on this list.

Not only that, but Feinstein is ostensibly the Senator of Silicon Valley, and should know better.

She's also the Senator of Hollywood, though, and traditionally the LA-based media industry has had more clout in California politics than the Bay-Area-based tech industry has.

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#57

Post by javert »

G_Wen wrote: post #3
stevejohnson wrote: post #2

I'm extremely surprised to see Franken on this list. Wasn't he outspoken against this sort of thing?

Yes, he was a pretty big advocate on net neutrality: http://www.alfranken.com/index.php/splash/netneutrality http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/08/19/can-al-franken-save-net... http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20011587-503544.html http://colorlines.com/archives/2010/08/600_convene_for_broad... Edit more links: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/07/senator-inte... http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/media/se…

What does this bill have in common with net neutrality? More government control of what is otherwise private property. It's consistent to support both.

Re: The 19 Senators Who Voted To Censor The Internet

#58

Post by tedunangst »

jacobolus wrote: post #42
tedunangst wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's actually besides the point. Once the seat trades parties a few times, the occupant will figure out that if they want to be reelected they have to listen to their constituents. Or so the theory goes.

What? There’s no way that this particular issue is near-and-dear to enough people that it will cause anything more than a blip in voter turnout or choices. If you want to make a difference, go do some real organizing and build some kind of momentum up behind your position. Complaining in an online discussion and declaring you’ll cast your individual ballot for the out-of-power candidate so long as both parties disagr…

I was merely explaining why someone may decide to vote against someone, even if the person they vote for is no better. I reserve my indignation for shit that matters, like variable names.
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