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Even More Restriction For German Internet
tikurion writes "It's only been a few weeks since the law dubbed Zugangserschwerungsgesetz (access impediment law) was passed in the German Parliament despite over 140,000 signatures of people opposed to it. The law will go into effect in mid-October 2009. Now Minister for Family Affairs Ursula von der Leyen implied in an interview that she is planning on extending the reach of the law, claiming '...or else the great Internet is in danger of turning into a lawless range of chaos, where you're allowed to bully, insult, and deceive limitlessly.' More on golem.de via Google translate (here is the German original)."
Because "Zensurulla" (censorship Ulla) as the German Miss Education has been nicknamed, has a long history of political stunts and blunders.
Very well remembered (even though she tried hard to downplay it and make it forgotten) was her attempt to encourage academics to have more kids. She was pissed at the "lowlives" who pump out baby after baby even though they couldn't get them what she deemed a good life and education, while people with PhD's simply don't have many kids, if any. So she envisioned a bonus for people with high education if they had more kids. Quickly nicknamed the "Akademikerwurfprämie" (university graduates litter bonus).
Appearantly she didn't take into account that a few hundred bucks a month ain't enough to encourage someone with a career and an income beyond 6k a month to toss it all for a kid if all they got in return was a bonus they could possibly only laugh at.
So now she stumbles with her feet firmly lodged in her mouth from one blunder to the next, hoping that she finally manages to come up with an idea that could possibly get her some recognition and make all the former "ideas" forgotten. Well, it works, but only because one stunt is even more harebrained than the one before.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.