Replies

You expect the right and left to get together on this one? Please think again.

The law introduced by McPain and his buddy, and subsequently passed by the two legislatures and signed by the President, (and not studied closely by the President) was enacted to curtail the electioneering by only the RIGHT; e.g., one example the NRA will not be able to suggest within 60 days before an election who should be elected.

In the meantime, the MSN are not stopped by the law; and given that most of the Media support the left, now do you still believe that the left will join with the right to stop the above movement by McPain?

The law introduced by McPain and his buddy, and subsequently passed by the two legislatures and signed by the President, (and not studied closely by the President)

Huh???

Can we please stop making excuses for the President on this? The fact of the matter is that he agrees that free speech is just a privilege, not a right, that can rightfully be taken away on a whim. Either that or he really didn't study it closely, which should throw up a HUGE red flag. After all, shouldn't we expect the President, the person we elected to lead us, to do his job and at least understand just what the hell comes across his desk that he is signing?

The never ending stream of apologists here is frightening.

You expect the right and left to get together on this one? Please think again.

Why wouldn't they? Together they've done a good job of keeping third parties down, and the internet represents the easiest and cheapest way for a third party to reach voters.

The internet is in many ways a threat to the status quo and the two parties, because all of the sudden the entrance fee for you or me, or anybody else wanting to be heard by large numbers of people has dropped to basically nothing.

Pardon my language, but it scares the shit out of both parties that you or I could throw up a website for free, and be heard by thousands, even hundreds of thousands or millions. We don't have to spend millions to get a TV station or network to run ads, we don't have to spend tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands or more on ads in magazines and newspapers.

I manage a website for a friend that is politically oriented - a couple of his commentaries have been linked to from here, and from some of the high profile Conservative-leaning bloggers, and literally his traffic goes from 500 people a day to ten thousand or more people in a few days. The site pays for itself through two small ad, and he writes in his spare time, just a few hours a week.

Sure, the Democrats and Republicans love the internet for getting messages out and organizing people, but many of the party leaders fear it, because of the above example, and because of sites like Drudge Report (nobody had heard of Drudge until he broke a story that led to the impeachment of a sitting President). They can spend $10 million on some campaign over some issue to reach X number of potential voters, and it can be negated by a half dozen people with websites that combined, easily cost less than $500 a month to maintain (which can easily be paid for through advertising).

It's very foolish (and dangerous) thinking that the right and the left are not worried about the influence of various websites.