Censorship Watch
The federal government is trying their best to seize information to which they have no right, and for which they have no relevant need:
That's a specious claim at best, with the analyzing party relying completely on subjective judgment and wild assumption to produce a final data set. I would expect no less from a Berkeley professor. What I can't figure out is why anyone from "Berzerkley" is willing to ally themselves with the Bush Administration on something like this. Unless he's planning on a blanket refutation from his "analysis," of course. Either way, I smell a (gold-plated) rat.
Even more disturbing is this statement from the zealot who led this charge:
That is a sweeping presupposition based upon personal prejudice, as well as an inherently unsupportable claim on the scale he is implying. Assumptions do not a theory make--or even a hypothesis. Moreover, it is sophistic rhetoric of the most political and self-serving sort. This advocacy group, and others like it, are the same clowns who fought against the .xxx domain proposal, which would have effectively compartmentalized all pornographic and ultra-violent material on the Internet. One has to wonder what their real agenda might be.
More than one freedom has been trampled in this country in the name of "protecting the children." While in this case I can see no particular violation of the First Amendment, as specific user originations are not being requested or provided to the government, neither do I see any point in the entire exercise. There is no possible valid conclusion which can be drawn from the data which they have requested, so the question arises: why do it at all? While the answer is undoubtedly buried in bureaucratic crust, it is also irrelevant, as the end result is quite clear: a further, ever-so-subtle erosion of privacy.
I'll have to tentatively side with the ACLU on this issue. There is neither a logical reason nor a legal right for the government to acquire the data in question. In such a case, I will always prefer to err on the side of caution by giving the government nothing.
Perhaps the most important point to be made here is that primary protection of children is not the responsibility of the government, but rather of the children's parents. I am not in any way comfortable with giving the federal government--whether this administration or any other--the political equivalent of a loaded gun with which to "protect children."
Hands off the Internet, Washington.
(Hat-tip to Pete K.)
Federal prosecutors preparing to defend a controversial Internet pornography law in court have asked Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and America Online to hand over millions of search records--a request that Google is adamantly denying.
To analyze the logs, the Justice Department has hired Philip Stark, a professor of statistics at the University of California, Berkeley. Stark said in a statement that analyzing information from Google would let him "estimate the prevalence of harmful-to-minors" and the "effectiveness of content filters" in blocking it.
That's a specious claim at best, with the analyzing party relying completely on subjective judgment and wild assumption to produce a final data set. I would expect no less from a Berkeley professor. What I can't figure out is why anyone from "Berzerkley" is willing to ally themselves with the Bush Administration on something like this. Unless he's planning on a blanket refutation from his "analysis," of course. Either way, I smell a (gold-plated) rat.
Even more disturbing is this statement from the zealot who led this charge:
Jack Samad, senior vice president for the National Coalition for Protection of Children and Families, a Cincinnati, Ohio-based advocacy group, said search engines should be willing to help the Bush administration defend the law.
"Young people are experiencing broken lives after being exposed to adult images and behaviors on the Internet..."
That is a sweeping presupposition based upon personal prejudice, as well as an inherently unsupportable claim on the scale he is implying. Assumptions do not a theory make--or even a hypothesis. Moreover, it is sophistic rhetoric of the most political and self-serving sort. This advocacy group, and others like it, are the same clowns who fought against the .xxx domain proposal, which would have effectively compartmentalized all pornographic and ultra-violent material on the Internet. One has to wonder what their real agenda might be.
More than one freedom has been trampled in this country in the name of "protecting the children." While in this case I can see no particular violation of the First Amendment, as specific user originations are not being requested or provided to the government, neither do I see any point in the entire exercise. There is no possible valid conclusion which can be drawn from the data which they have requested, so the question arises: why do it at all? While the answer is undoubtedly buried in bureaucratic crust, it is also irrelevant, as the end result is quite clear: a further, ever-so-subtle erosion of privacy.
I'll have to tentatively side with the ACLU on this issue. There is neither a logical reason nor a legal right for the government to acquire the data in question. In such a case, I will always prefer to err on the side of caution by giving the government nothing.
Perhaps the most important point to be made here is that primary protection of children is not the responsibility of the government, but rather of the children's parents. I am not in any way comfortable with giving the federal government--whether this administration or any other--the political equivalent of a loaded gun with which to "protect children."
Hands off the Internet, Washington.
(Hat-tip to Pete K.)
posted by Jar(egg)head at 12:21
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home