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Senator Diane Feinstein Trying to Kill Net Neutrality
An anonymous reader writes "According to the Register, Senator Diane Feinstein is attempting to put language into the stimulus bill that would kill net neutrality. The amendment that her provision was attached to was withdrawn, but lobbyists tell Public Knowledge that Feinstein hopes to put it back into the bill during the closed-door conference committee that reconciles the House and Senate versions." Bad Senator! No Cookie!
She needs to be investigated for her conflict of interest between her position as chair on the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee and her husband's firms receiving billions of dollars of defense construction contracts. Oops. She's the chair of the Senate Rules Committee. I guess there won't be any investigations.
When all else fails, run.
The Democrats have always been in the pocket of RIAA/MPAA/Hollywood types. Look up Hillary Rosen if you have any doubts. Republicans have scr*w*d up the country but on this issue, they have always been a better alternative. Not because they are more moral or anything, but because they are not as beholden to the Hollywood set.
when you look at the long-term contribution trends http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=B02
Cheers, Mike
She's not a good Democrat. Step 1 for Democrats was to get more elected Democrats. Now that is accomplished, step 2 is to get better Democrats.
Feinstein and many others will probably be facing primary challengers for the next election. We can certainly find better Democrats than these people.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
This, amongst the other chicanery of congress, is yet another example of why we need to impose single purpose limitations on the bills congress tries to pass.
They can take their riders and try to get them passed as stand alone bills.
Both parties are bought and paid for.
That anyone ever thinks differently must lack critical thinking. The people in power are corrupt, and the weaker party, which happened to be in power last time, is going to swoop in and fix everything.
Fuck, half the problem is that this country wasn't set up as a democracy, but a republic. But then it started with electing the president directly instead of state legislatures deciding themselves, sending electors that were little more rubberstamps, and then an amendment where the senators get voted in by the people, instead, again, of the electors deciding. The republic originally envisioned would have had several layers, with people voting the bottom local layer, and then those layer of people voting up another level, etc.
The net effect is that, I as a lone and insignificant voter, instead of just voting for a few people that I know better on a local people - get swamped with choices on every level - local, state, federal. Who has the time for it? You know how people complain about choice and linux distros? This is 100x worse. The end effect is that people start voting down the line for parties. National Parties evolved.
Such a system also gives the mainstream media undue power, puppet strings whereby to agitate voters into their agendas who in turn wail to their politicians, all the way up to Senators and Presidents, about the latest insignificant thing. It's not a good way to keep government limited if people always demand things from the government. If senators, as originally, were appointed by state legislators or governors - there would be focused on more than winning the next election.
Corporations are much more powerful than people: they are after all comprised of people, who can vote; they can "live" longer than people; they typically have much more money and resources than people, with which to lobby governments; and since there are generally many people working for a corporation, they have a lot more person-hours to spend on lobbying, etc. than a natural person.
Way to make it personal, asshole. I'm a college student so I can get away with charging 20 bucks an hour undercutting everyone else (high gas prices and an outdated website, you see; the website does no selling for me) and it's still a reasonable amount of money considering my expenses -- and I'm really good at what I do, if my continued referrals mean anything.
Discarding the politics of personal destruction and returning to the issues, it's silly of you to assert that only Democrats have dissonance within their ranks. There are many varied viewpoints in the Republican party, from the wacky (and IMO quite stupid) Creationists to the pro-abortion, pro-gay-marriage Giuliani conservatives to the corrupt idiots like Ted Stevens who I'm happy to see go. People like me consider the Ted Stevenses and the Arlen Specters and the Olympia Snowes (the latter two of which supported this pork-laden stimulus package in the Senate) to be, as you say, wolves in sheeps' clothing.
And unfortunately, Barack was pitched to us as a messenger from fairy land sent to save us all, that he would magically make everything better. He can't even instill his own purported values of transparency, freedom of information and clean government in his own party members despite his sweeping election. There is no hope for them; indeed, I think they've started to rub off on him -- there are no pork or earmarks in the stimulus bill, but there are special spending projects and shovel-ready construction projects and countless other Democrat special projects that just can't wait to garner Democrat votes with government dollars.
We already have net neutrality. They want the ability to charge a website for bandwidth that their users are accessing. Now this might be silly but I assume people spending lot's of money lobbing for something only do so when they are planning to start doing it.
Removal of net neutrality would have some key effects:
To be fair, Bush's TARP plan was basically "put a giant pile of money on the table, turn your back, and whatever the banks want they can take". The Obama plan is far more directed and includes oversight as well as earmarks to reduce the chance that the money just goes directly into someone's pocket, never to be seen again.
I read the internet for the articles.
Then why do these idiots keep re-electing people like Feinstein? She's done nothing but raise taxes, vote away our rights, and spend money.
THIS California resident votes for whoever the hell runs against her, but it's a lost cause so long as she has all that name recognition.
"Democracy: that ultimate triumph of quantity over quality." -- Peter H. Peel
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Term limits would also get rid of the honest, competent politicians who serve their constituents with integrity.
If we ever get anyone like that, it will be a shame to lose them because of term limits.
Sarcasm isn't really a rebuttal. But then you knew that, right?
You could try reading Betsy McCaughey's op-ed about the piece, or better yet, go read the actual bill in question yourself. And note that that web site is GPO (Government Printing Office), not GOP - I'm sure some dyslexic will misread it and accuse me of being a shill for the Republicans.
Point of fact: nowhere in the bill is an "open" standard for medical records referenced or called for.
Point of fact: In this bill, the government is appointing itself as the entity to ensure that everybody (yes, everybody - there don't appear to be any provisions for people who wish to opt out) has electronic medical records by 2014. The government has also tasked this bureaucracy with developing infrastructure to facilitate the exchange of those medical records.
When any agency (government or private) nominates itself as the caretaker of extensive private information about you, it's wise to have privacy concerns. I don't mean tin-foil hat conspiracy theories, I mean, there should be full & accurate disclosure as to what privacy controls are in place, so that the public can understand & offer feedback on the proposal.
The GP's last 2 sentences are actually spot-on. An economic stimulus bill is NOT the place for a tacked-on afterthought which creates a sweeping change to the country's medical landscape. There are legitimate privacy questions & concerns in the creation of electronic medical records, and to just stuff them into this bill stifles open & constructive debate on exactly what safeguards should be put in place.
Slashdot readers fumed over the PATRIOT act's potential for violating their privacy; this provision could have equally far-reaching impact on your private, personal medical records. So bottom line, I'm asking you to answer this one question:
WHY is the fact that the government wants to take full or partial control of your medical records NOT a cause for concern for you?
Please answer in a complete sentence that doesn't begin with either of these two phrases:
1) "Because President Obama says..."
2) "Well it's not like it's President Bush..."
Abraham Lincoln when he acted like George Dubya - like a military dictator.
Lincoln went a lot further than GWB ever dreamed. If GWB had the cojones of Lincoln he would installed puppet governments in the state capitols of the blue states that opposed his policies and ordered the army to arrest the entire editorial board (well, except Kristol) of the New York Times.
People who blindly idolize Lincoln really need to open a history book and see what he was all about. I'm not convinced that forcing the South to remain a part of the Union at gunpoint was really worth it.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Then why do these idiots keep re-electing people like Feinstein? She's done nothing but raise taxes, vote away our rights, and spend money.
Because her opponent in every election would do nothing but raise taxes, vote away a different group of your rights, and spend money.