No, no, no. The Internet Freedom Act isn't about freedom for you as an internet user and you should know by now that when a Republican uses the word Freedom it's about corporate control over your options. John McCain's "freedom act" appears now, after we've just begun to recover from eight years of the Bush FCC acting as a wholly owned subsidiary of big communications corporations; fudging the science and ignoring its own rules with impunity. Under Michael Powell and Kevin Martin, the Commission has stifled, hidden and falsified studies concerning the adverse effects on the public airwaves and even disaster relief services, of using power lines as a conductor for broadband internet and has made censorship of "indecency" a prime directive. It's high time they were prevented from protecting the public interest rather than the power of the telecommunications industry and the religious right.
If McCain's legislation is passed, the Internet Service Providers will have the power to limit your web bandwidth and mine and give preference to - you guessed it - the people they like, the people they own and the people who say what they want said. Have a blog that criticizes Comcast? Back to the days of 300 baud for you old chap! Fox News can blaze along at any speed they like with all the streaming and screaming video and Glennbeckery they can produce and the FCC won't be able to represent you. The freedom of giant corporations and puritanical moralists to censor you -- that's the kind of freedom John McCain thinks is worth fighting for!
Captain, it seems John McCain has taken linguistic lessons from Karl Rove when he named his bill the Internet Freedom Act,
ReplyDeleteAs you point out, “freedom” for whom? Lets look at our recent linguistic past for examples of false and misleading sloganeering:
Compassionate Conservative – sugarcoating for a range of policies that was anything but compassionate
I am a uniter, not a divider -- meaning the opposite of bipartisan cooperation
Tax relief -- more money in the pockets of voters turned into a massive transfer of more wealth to the wealthy
Judicial Activism -- The real activists turned out to be rightwing reactionary judges who overturned legal precedents.
Thus, in the tradition of Republican dissembling and Karl Rove linguistic manipulation, these words mean the opposite of what they say. The Internet represents the last bastion of free speech; of course the right wing machine and their corporate sponsors want to control it. Not this time, goddamit!
Have you noticed how hard the freaks are pushing the "Orwellian" accusations aimed at Obama and his supporters? That's of course because they are masters of Newspeak wherein censoring the internet is internet freedom.
ReplyDeleteRemember the Bizarro World comics?
At least there are some folks out there getting wise to this stuff.
ReplyDeleteTwo months ago, when the Astroturfers were out in force, support for the public option sank below 40%. Since that time, truth emerged: Insurance company death panels are real; everything from childbirth to rape is a pre-existing condition. Support for the public option has returned ... even among a majority of Republicans. Outright lying confers only a short-term advantage.
In other news this week, it was reported that only 20% of Americans self-identify as Republicans ... an all-time low. The screamers make loud noises far beyond their numbers, but we pay too much attention when giving them too much audience.
Bottom line: While McCain is pandering to the right wing of his party, his bill has less chance than an ice cube in Hell.