Dick Turban, a Senator, will introduce legislation to force companies that sell things over the Internet to calculate and collect taxes for the state (or locality) to which it is shipped. States complain that items bought over the Internet do not have the appropriate taxes collected and they miss out on revenue.

To me this is no different than when someone stops in one state and makes a purchase and then takes the item to his home state. What did the state in which the person resides do to warrant receiving revenue?

The matter will go nowhere for a number of reasons. There are thousands of taxes in many localities and it would be a daunting task to try to program websites to calculate the taxes. To top it off, some states like Maryland will raise taxes on a regular basis so that will mean more work and higher costs for web retailers.

The matter also has some Constitutional issue around it. Matters of taxes are supposed to originate in the House and the man introducing the legislation is in the Senate. Unless he gets someone in the House to introduce it, I don’t see how it can be introduced. Also, this is about state and local taxes so why is a member of the federal government involved in the issue?

Finally, the House is controlled by Republicans and regardless of whether one thinks this is a good idea or not, they do not want to be blamed for imposing taxes on people.

Even if this made it to the Senate I can’t see how they get the 60 votes needed for cloture.

This will be a sticky issue because more and more people shop online. Government likes to find things people do and tax it so it can get more money.

Dick Turban is saying that the playing field needs to be leveled so that brick and mortar stores can compete with Internet retailers.

Why is it that everything has to be a level playing field? Imagine if Major League Baseball required all teams to be the same…

I have an idea though. If Durbin wants a level playing field then have the states and localities eliminate sales taxes all together. Then the brick and mortar stores will be on a level playing field…..

Cave Canem!
Never surrender, never submit.

Nancy Pelosi had something to say about the anti net neutrality rule voted on in the House on Friday. She said she did not think it was going anywhere. Imagine how Pelosi would have reacted if the Republicans had said that even though the House voted for Obamacare it was not going anywhere and then they decided to ignore what took place. Republicans are using legal methods to defund and repeal the albatross. Pelosi and her cohorts just ignore laws, procedures and the will of the people.

They have ignored a judges’ ruling on drilling moratoriums and they have ignored the ruling that Obamacare is unconstitutional. Here is how Pelosi sees it:

“No one should be guarding the gate on the Internet,” Pelosi said. She said despite the House vote, the resolution isn’t likely to gain support in the Senate. “I don’t think this bill is going anyplace,” Pelosi predicted. National Journal

Funny, but politicians want to give Barry Obama an Internet kill switch and they want the government to be able to control the Internet, reportedly in the event of an emergency. However, her tune changes when she says that no one should be guarding the internet.

As far as I am concerned, companies provide access to the Internet and people pay for it (which might be considered guarding it by some). If those companies want to restrict certain access or control what goes on over their networks then it is their business.

The last thing we need is government intervention in the use of the Internet and we certainly do not need politicians controlling the Internet via kill switches or anything else.

I know that the Internet provides instant information (a lot of it wrong) and that does not bode well for people like Obama, Pelosi, Reid (and most other politicians) who like to say one thing at one event and a totally different thing at another. A hundred years ago communications were slow and these things were attributed to misquotes or miscommunication.

Today we have them in their own words and we can use those words against them. They do not like it one bit.

To control the people the government controls things like their health care and their communications.

What better way to get us closer to Socialism than to stifle messages they do not like. Remember, if government can decide how the Internet operates then it can decide what is on it and who can post to it. It can also decide who can access it.

Very dangerous indeed.

Pelosi is a moron.

Cave Canem!
Never surrender, never submit.

Don Imus made the mistake of trying to be funny about a female college basketball team and he used the term “Nappy Headed Hos.” As soon as he did the race baiting poverty pimps came out of the closet and none other than the cheif race antagonist Al Sharpton was leading the charge. Sharpton called for Imus to be fired and Obama got in on the act as well. Imus went on Al Sharpton’s radio program and had to grovel. After apologizing a million different ways, Imus was fired. He still went to the college to apologize to the ladies in person.

I am waiting for Sharpton to slither out from under his rock and start raising hell about the latest Nappy Head comment. This comment was made by Mignon Clyburn, daughter of Congressman James Clyburn. Obama FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said that free internet was a civil right for every nappy headed child (around the 2:50 mark).

I will not be holding my breath waiting for Sharpton to demand this woman’s firing because she happens to be black.

That will make all the difference in the world even though Sharpton went after Imus and the entire time preached how this kind of talk was racist and needed to stop. He will ignore Clyburn because she is black. If by some remote chance he says anything you can bet it will not rise to the level of demanding that she be fired.

As an aside, free internet is not a civil right for anyone, nappy headed or otherwise. It is no more a civil right than owning a cell phone, owning a car, owning a house or “free” health care. These are not rights of any kind whatsoever. They are commodities that are purchased by those who desire them and who can afford them. In the absence of the ability to afford them people do without or they work out some method of paying for them (particularly true with health care). However, with health care people often skip out on the bill and leave everyone else to pay for it. Remember, everyone has access to health care. The issue boils down to who pays for it…

But the issue at hand is the use of the words “nappy headed.”

If Sharpton and the rest of the race baiters are truly serious about race relations and stopping the use of such terms then they will be calling for Clyburn to be fired. If they ignore this then they are as worthless as I believe them to be and they should never be taken seriously again (I know, I can’t believe people take them seriously but they do). In other words, the next time they are outraged at something, tar and feather them.

I would not normally call for the firing of Clyburn. I did not think what Imus said and the way he said it warranted his dismissal and I would give Clyburn the benefit of the doubt even though it is quite obvious from what she says that she knew it was wrong. It was not spontaneous like the outburst from Imus. It was planned.

But I would still give her the benefit of the doubt for choosing her words poorly.

I would have. However, Sharpton and the rest of the race baiters set the standard for how this kind of behavior should be treated. It demands nothing less than dismissal because that is what they decided the punishment should be.

So I call on Sharpton to get out in the street and call for Clyburn to be fired and I call on Barack Obama to dismiss her for her insensitivity and use of racially charged language.

While I am at it, I call on the Congressional Black Caucus to get involved and call for Clyburn’s resignation.

It is time to put up or shut up folks. If you do not have the integrity to call for her to be fired then you have no right to complain about any future infraction.

The ball is in your court. What is your next move?

I bet Don Imus is taking gas over this.

Cave Canem!
Never surrender, never submit.

In 1998 when Bill Clinton’s sex scandal was the big news, news that broke because Matt Drudge posted it after it was quashed in the MSM, Hilary had an opinion about the Internet. Hillary said she did not know what she was in favor of but it sounded like she favored some kind of regulation.

…I don’t know what — that’s why I said I don’t know what I’m in favor of. And I don’t know enough to know what to be in favor of, because I think it’s one of those new issues we’ve got to address. We’ve got to see whether our existing laws protect people’s right of privacy, protect them against defamation. And if they can, how do you do that when you can press a button and you can’t take it back. So I think we have to tread carefully. Drudge Report

Hillary said that without some kind of gatekeeping function it was difficult to defend a reputation. It probably did not occur to her that Bill’s reputation was hurt when he had the affair and then lied about it. If he had been telling the truth then it would have been Drudge’s reputation that needed to be defended.

Thirteen years later and with news of China continuing to censor the Internet, Ms. Clinton still has an opinion though it is different than it was back then.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday called for an unfettered worldwide Internet and urged global condemnation of those who conduct cyber attacks, as China sought to contain tension with the United States over the hacking and censorship of Google.

“A new information curtain is descending across much of the world,” she said, calling growing Internet curbs the modern equivalent of the Berlin Wall.

“We stand for a single Internet where all of humanity has equal access to knowledge and ideas,” said Clinton in a major address that cited China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt among countries that censored the Internet or harassed bloggers. Yahoo News

Well things have certainly changed with regard to her position on this.

Did it change because the scandal left Bill relatively unscathed and now China is the focus?

What do you think prompted her position reversal? I would be interested to read your opinions in the comment section.

Actually, this post is not as bright and funny as the farce The Producers, by Mel Brooks- this is just about the same old mundane dictatorial powers that any old power- mad Socialist would have, indeed, this has already been done in this hemisphere. As we have seen, Hugo Chavez has taken over the media in his country, all the better to keep “his” country on “his” message.

Apparently it’s like the new x-box- every little dictator now wants this, and Hussein is no different, To hell with those pesky little amendments, especially the first one- you know, the freedom to speak freely, to assemble, religion, all that jazz- well, we really don’t need that do we? Especially if people are going to be critical of the Resident- his feelings get hurt so easily.

Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.

They’re not much happier about a revised version that aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, have spent months drafting behind closed doors. CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency.

The new version would allow the president to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” relating to “non-governmental” computer networks and do what’s necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a federal certification program for “cybersecurity professionals,” and a requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been awarded that license.

“I think the redraft, while improved, remains troubling due to its vagueness,” said Larry Clinton, president of the Internet Security Alliance, which counts representatives of Verizon, Verisign, Nortel, and Carnegie Mellon University on its board. “It is unclear what authority Sen. Rockefeller thinks is necessary over the private sector. Unless this is clarified, we cannot properly analyze, let alone support the bill.”

news.cnet.com

This is troubling, but not unexpected, given the way the Resident is mangling all our other freedoms, in the name of  ”an emergency”- ooooh, Uncle Hugo would be soooooo proud- little Barry is growing up- it’s just soooooo cute when dictators learn to take away their first liberties. Did anyone get a picture?

The Rockefeller proposal plays out against a broader concern in Washington, D.C., about the government’s role in cybersecurity. In May, President Obama acknowledged that the government is “not as prepared” as it should be to respond to disruptions and announced that a new cybersecurity coordinator position would be created inside the White House staff. Three months later, that post remains empty, one top cybersecurity aide has quit, and some wags have begun to wonder why a government that receives failing marks on cybersecurity should be trusted to instruct the private sector what to do.

Rockefeller’s revised legislation seeks to reshuffle the way the federal government addresses the topic. It requires a “cybersecurity workforce plan” from every federal agency, a “dashboard” pilot project, measurements of hiring effectiveness, and the implementation of a “comprehensive national cybersecurity strategy” in six months–even though its mandatory legal review will take a year to complete.

The privacy implications of sweeping changes implemented before the legal review is finished worry Lee Tien, a senior staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco. “As soon as you’re saying that the federal government is going to be exercising this kind of power over private networks, it’s going to be a really big issue,” he says.

Probably the most controversial language begins in Section 201, which permits the president to “direct the national response to the cyber threat” if necessary for “the national defense and security.” The White House is supposed to engage in “periodic mapping” of private networks deemed to be critical, and those companies “shall share” requested information with the federal government. (“Cyber” is defined as anything having to do with the Internet, telecommunications, computers, or computer networks.)

news.cnet.com

You know, I hate to say I told you so, but I surely did. This is what happens when you give idiot children matches- you shouldn’t be surprised when your house burns down, and here and now, the possibility exists in a dramatically more “real” fashion than ever before. 

First you have the “Diversity Thug” wanting to silence Talk Radio, which he will extend to TV (just watch)- and now a new law to shut down the internet in case of an (wonderfully vague) “emergency”- sounds a lot like the “denial of services” attacks Russia made on Georgia, crippling their communications before Russia attacked that country. 

But this is our own country- who are they afraid of? Who are they planning to attack? 

“The language has changed but it doesn’t contain any real additional limits,” EFF’s Tien says. “It simply switches the more direct and obvious language they had originally to the more ambiguous (version)…The designation of what is a critical infrastructure system or network as far as I can tell has no specific process. There’s no provision for any administrative process or review. That’s where the problems seem to start. And then you have the amorphous powers that go along with it.”

Translation: If your company is deemed “critical,” a new set of regulations kick in involving who you can hire, what information you must disclose, and when the government would exercise control over your computers or network.

The Internet Security Alliance’s Clinton adds that his group is “supportive of increased federal involvement to enhance cyber security, but we believe that the wrong approach, as embodied in this bill as introduced, will be counterproductive both from an national economic and national secuity perspective.”

news.cnet.com

Yep- it’s coming- totalitarian control. It will be slow but steady- you will hardly notice when they wrap the coils of oppression around you. The groundwork is beginning- brought to you by “progressives” from both sides of the aisle. You might think I am delusional- some of the liberals that come here certainly will, but then they refuse to see the evidence in front of their own eyes, and that’s great for them.

Until the day where they do not agree with the Resident and his minions.

By then it is too late.

” When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another….”
This is the beginning of our Declaration of Independence, one of the seminal documents of the past three centuries regarding government and its powers and limitations over the people government presides over. The other major document, The Constitution, delineates the powers and the limits of those powers the government may impose.

One of the rights the Constitution provides is Freedom of Speech- a “right” the Iranians are really trying to exercise, through networking, the Facebook and MySpace sites, twitter, and text messaging. Because the Iranian government is a totalitarian regime, and seeks to control their people, they have been busy censoring these various messaging mediums as soon as they can.

Luckily for the Iranians, this is tantamount to plugging holes in a dyke with a finger- it won’t hold for long before another hole springs up.

These people are truly brave- here in our country, if you protest, you might be called a bad name- there, you might be shot, or worse. What’s worse than being shot? Would you really want to know first hand? I doubt it- I know that I would not, but these people risk worse than being shot just by protesting their governments stolen election.

Shortly after Neda Agha-Soltan bled her life out on the Tehran pavement, the man whose 40-second video of her death has ricocheted around the world made a somber calculation in what has become the cat-and-mouse game of evading Iran’s censors. He knew that the government had been blocking Web sites like YouTube andFacebook. Trying to send the video there could have exposed him and his family.

Instead, he e-mailed the two-megabyte video to a nearby friend, who quickly forwarded it to the Voice of America, the newspaper The Guardian in London and five online friends in Europe, with a message that read, “Please let the world know.” It was one of those friends, an Iranian expatriate in the Netherlands, who posted it on Facebook, weeping as he did so, he recalled.

nytimes.com

Yep, these Iranian thugs of the government would have gone after not only the people texting and taking videos, but also their families. What a free and fair government they are. This is stifling free speech on a grand scale, over the little matter of a stolen election. Jimmy Carter would have said it was a fair and free election, but Iran is one country where he has not the fortitude to travel to, even if they would let him.

What is truly disheartening, is the fact that despite all of Hussein’s high and  mighty rhetoric on freedoms that he espoused in Cairo, there has not been a statement coming from the White House that could be said to even remotely have a spine to it.

I understand that Hussein has a calculating mind, but it seems that he wants the current regime to stay in power, thus the limp- wristed commentary he has issued. Perhaps he has more in common with the current dictators than first appears to meet the eye. I hope not, but there could be at least a statement of solidarity with all who seek freedom- but nooooooo.

At least the Internet, and all its permutations, make free speech more possible, and not less so, and this is a good thing- now, if only the President might use his personal bully pulpit, employ his freedom of speech, and at least get his butt off of the fence long enough to say something substantial about a peoples struggle for freedom.

Perhaps he could use his powers to Twitter.

Well, it’s coming, there’s going to be a new sheriff in town, and he’s going to want to regulate the Internet in such a way as to ostensibly “protect the public interest”, but in reality, find a way to suck money from the interactions of the internet , whether it’s chat rooms, blogs, or internet commerce. Everything will become regulated, and because it will be regulated, it will also be monitored for threats, for content, and for bias (against the regulators, of course).

I am not a lawyer, and do not claim to be prescient, but with Barama taxing the snot out of everything else, including the 95% he said would get a tax break, it stands to reason that the internet, which has remained like the wild west, relatively free, would fall under his money grubbing scrutiny sooner rather than later. How else does he think he can fund his health care, and begin to muzzle criticism of his policies?

The FCC will soon have a 3-2 Democrat majority.  It’s no secret that two of the Democrats serving on the FCC favor restoring balance to talk radio – in other words, they would move conservatives out and balance them with liberals.  They call it balance and diversity, but whenever government regulates free speech, it is censorship.  Whenever government proscribes a certain amount of speech, it is speech control.  John Madison who helped craft the First Amendment would roll over in his grave. 

This debate is one of the hottest topics on radio today and with the White House declaration of war on Rush Limbaugh there is almost a fever pitch in Washington by Democrats to take back the airwaves because they think conservatives dominate talk radio and Fox News.  That’s true.  But, we don’t dominate the rest of the media which includes hundreds of NPR stations, the liberal network Air America, dozens of cable news and public affairs channels, dozens of magazines, 1400 newspapers, and tens of thousands of Internet sites. 

On any given day, Americans can get any point of view anywhere which makes the argument for control of American airwaves moot, at best.  Yet, the debate is moving ahead and Democrats are carefully writing language for regulation of our broadcast media.  It is personal for them.  They want to control it all and they want to eliminate conservative views from the media. Big Hollywood

This will of course, include the media known as the Internet- where Barama’s most vociferous critics reside, as well as many of his most ardent supporters. It’s a constant give and take on the blog sites, but how much tamer will it be when the regulators come in and write their rules for this free speech media? How much will this cost to send information or opinion out into the ether?

As it stands right now, the spirited discussion can sometimes get out of hand and off topic, but I know I would rather have that than to be told what to do or say, or how many words I was allotted. This will change, and not for the better if  Skinny B and his Chicago posse get their way.

With Democratic majorities in Congress and a liberal Democratic administration we can blunt the political influence of media conglomerates and the Right. That is why the Republicans and their corporate media sponsors want to destroy Net Neutrality. They know from their experience with talk radio and the creation of Fox News that corporate absorption of the Internet and ending net neutrality would be a propaganda coup.

The Obama Administration’s Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and a revivified Anti-Trust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice could pursue all sorts of reforms that would open up the nation’s political discourse. A few minor changes in the rules and regulations governing the public airwaves and corporate media consolidation could transform the political economy of the media sector. Such reforms would make it more difficult for networks to shove people like Cheney, Rove, and Fleischer down our throats because enhanced competition would mean that rivals might be broadcasting more attractive fare. Breaking up Rupert Murdoch’s empire (starting with revoking the waiver that allows him to own the New York Post), and busting up Clear Channel’s monopoly of radio would be a good place to start. Congress, working with the Obama Administration, could then revisit the odious Telecommunications Act of 1996 and remove or rework its worst provisions. Huffington Post

Yep- this is just a start on the Brave, New World of the Liberal- speak. Note that they say that the “fairness doctrine”, or as they speak of it,”Net Neutrality”, in their minds, is being threatened by the big, bad Murdoch and his Fox News, and ownership of the New York Post- because these entities say things Liberals don’t like.  It doesn’t matter that these things are true, they are unpleasant for these lotus- eating libs, and they must be regulated for more “attractive fare” Lovely.

What I find funny is that the author of this article in the Huffington Post, Jim Palermo, feels as though ALL the media is like Fox News- how absurd. a five minute viewing on virtually any other channel would reveal the liberal bias of those networks, but that’s not enough for Skinny B- no, he wants it all, and no criticism of his teleprompter either. Perhaps that is what is behind the creation of his little OTV station. State- run Television- oh boy, doesn’t that send a tingle up YOUR leg?

Liberals are so consumed with (still) trashing any possible revival of the Bush name and all associated with it, that they are almost cross-eyed , like a cat that was dunked in cold water. Any possible network, whether it be radio, TV, or Internet, will be controlled by these people through these laws, so as to silence dissent from any quarter.

But what happens when the libs begin to dissent? As they will- they are so quarrelsome that when there are no voices from the right left to be heard, they will turn on themselves in a remarkable display of backbiting.

That is, if Barama allows them to.

Barack Obama and his campaign have vowed to come out swinging and put up a more aggressive fight. Obama feels that the Republicans are liars and that he must defend his honor and his chances by hitting them hard. His newest “hard hit” is an ad that makes a bad attempt at painting John McCain as someone who has not changed.

The ad starts off with the year 1982 emblazoned on the screen and McCain with a pair of big out of style glasses and says that in 1982 McCain went to Washington. Then we see a disco ball, a huge cell phone, Rubik’s Cube, and a computer with an email icon. The narrator explains that a lot has changed since then but McCain has not. Then it disparages him because he does not use a computer and does not know how to send email.

I think the ad will backfire. I know Obama is trying to hit the younger crowd. You know that crowd. It is full of self absorbed people who seek instant gratification and who always have to have the latest and greatest electronic gadget and can’t function without a cell phone stuck in their ears. This is the crowd that cannot find Vietnam (or many countries including the US) on a globe. Obama is appealing to them by deriding a man who is of a generation that is the least tech savvy. The ad is trying to show McCain has not changed but many elderly will see it as an attack on senior citizens. Obama might lose a number of people from a generation that is the most reliable voting block by trying to appeal to those who traditionally do not show up on election day.

That is a possibility but I think Obama has made a much more serious error. He has opened up the past as an avenue for exploration. Of course he has had his army of dirt bags in Alaska trying to dig up dirt from Sarah Palin’s past but Barry does not like to discuss his own past. We know the buzz words; too young, in the past, distraction, yada, yada, yada. The past is probably on the list of things Barry will not allow to be discussed but he has opened that door.

Obama opened up his past by discussing McCain’s and he could pay for that. It will now be fair to question Obama about his drug use when he used all kinds of drugs and used them a lot. He has stated that his drug use was his greatest moral failure and that it was a bad choice. Since Joe Biden said Hillary would have been a better pick than he, we can make the case that Obama made bad choices then and he makes bad choices now.

The first pinhead who talks about McCain being stuck in the past and not about change can expect to be asked about Obama’s drug use and how he can possibly be change we can believe in when he still makes bad choices.

BTW, McCain reads email but does not send it and he knows how to use a computer (not terribly well). The Obama ad does not mention that Bill Clinton only sent 2 emails during his term and said he did not understand the internet (and the inventor of it was his VP). McCain said he talks to people by phone and that he uses the internet to read his daughter’s blog and the news. However, he is unable to type effectively because of his war injuries. NRO reports this from a story that appeared in the Boston Globe in 2000. NRO also makes this point:

Oh one last point for now: Lord knows I think the chicken-hawk arguments are stupid. And I don’t think the fact that Obama never served in the military should count against him in and of itself. But how stupid is it for the Obama campaign to claim that McCain is unqualified to be president because he can’t grasp cyber-security issues based on the fact he has never sent an email when the McCain campaign can just as easily say Obama can’t understand first order national security issues because he’s never fired a rife, flown a plane, commanded men in battle, or faced an enemy? I mean which prepares someone to be commander in chief better, hitting “send” on AOL or fighting a war? [emphasis mine]