White House Opposes Key SOPA Provisions

twdorris writes "Is this an example of our 3-part government actually working as intended? It seems the executive branch doesn't agree with the legislative on a key piece of SOPA. From the article: '"While we believe that online piracy by foreign websites is a serious problem that requires a serious legislative response, we will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global internet," the White House said in a blog post.'"

Comments

They can say they oppose it,

[Gideon Wells]

They can say they oppose it, but do they oppose it enough to actually Veto it when/if it gets passed? Or will it be "We'll sign it, but we'll say we disagree adamantly on this post-it not attached to it!"

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[modmans2ndcoming]

They could have ignored the issue entirely if they were planning to let it pass. It is not like this issue is something covered on Fox and MSNBC and CNN.

I do think they will support a heavily modified version that meets their published requirements because as they say in their statement, they support legislation to curtail piracy....just not stupid legislation that breaks the internet, hurts the ability of start-ups to innovate, ignores due process and limits free speech.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[artor3]

That will likely depend on whether or not its passed by a veto proof majority. Frankly, I'm starting to think it won't pass at all, given the momentum the opposition has been building lately. Of course, that means that we need to keep up the pressure. Calling your senators and representative once a week to see where they stand is a good start. They'll likely be wishy-washy at first, but that's why you make your desires clear, and then call the next week to follow up and see if they've cemented an opinion yet. Keep going until they commit to opposing it. And if they're dead set on supporting it, remember that primary season is just around the corner, and has lower turnout -- meaning that a smaller, well-motivated group of voters can make a change. (Unless they're a senator elected in 2010, in which case they can do whatever the hell they want, and you'll forget about it by 2016.)

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't "the White House" also oppose the NDAA, which they then refused to veto?

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Vetoproof shouldn't mean you shouldn't veto it. Clinton signed in the Glass-Steagal repeal, and it was veto proof(bipartisan even), doesn't mean he shouldn't have said "I don't want to go down in history as the monster that signed this piece of shiat"

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like how he opposed NDAA and then signed it.

Do NOT trust that man, He is not honorable, not any more.

and yes, I voted for him, but he proved that he is no different than the freedom hating republicans when he signed that law that makes us no different than IRAN, north Korea or China.

The White house will do what it's masters tell him to do. Obama will gleefully sign any bill like SOPA.

My only hope is that the rest of my fellow americans wake up and voted for a third party, The democrats and republicans are a blight on america and our freedoms.

Our only chance is to vote them all out of office with men who are not corrupt to begin with.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Lumpy]

Yes, which proves that they lie as bad as the republicans.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Aighearach]

They could have ignored the issue entirely if they were planning to let it pass.

No, there is a new government transparency mechanism at the White House https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petitions where you can vote on stuff, or create petitions to vote on, and the ones that get a lot of votes get official policy responses. It is not a mechanism for changes, but it is a mechanism to discover official positions on a wide variety of issues, including ones that would not otherwise get responses.

Sign up, vote on some stuff, and then when the response is published you'll get an email.

The ones that disagree with stuff that already has an official positions are useless, of course.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

The only reason there was a response to the community from the White House on this issue is because of their 'We The People' petitions section that the administration set up. Enough people signed the petition so they did what they promised, issued a response. The actual merit of it, however, has not been clearly defined in any policy I've seen so far.

Make your own White House Petition here: https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Elections are coming, they can't afford any bad publicity. Just because they say they oppose "some" SOPA provisions, actually means, they'll have to modify it a little, and they both get to win, SOPA supporters don't lose anything important, and White House, says, look, we negotiated for you. If they really opposed it, the article would have been titled "White House Opposes SOPA.". Notice that? Just a couple of words, that's how politics works.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Arancaytar]

It is not like this issue is something covered on Fox and MSNBC and CNN.

Ever since 2008, elections aren't won by ignoring the internet, and Obama of all people knows it.

Not to say this is all idle campaign talk. I have high hope that whatever we end up with won't be the end-of-democracy-as-we-know-it bill we have now. It might not even be as bad as the DMCA, and the internet survived that one. But it'll still be bad legislation, because the very principle behind it is trying to solve the wrong problem the wrong way.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Arancaytar]

no different than IRAN, north Korea or China.

IRAN is an acronym now? What's it stand for?

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Ethanol-fueled]

It is a portmanteu of IRaq and AfghanistAN.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[betterunixthanunix]

A fact that was never in question by anyone who spent more than 2 seconds examining American politics.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[genner]

It is not like this issue is something covered on Fox and MSNBC and CNN.

Ever since 2008, elections aren't won by ignoring the internet, and Obama of all people knows it.

Not to say this is all idle campaign talk. I have high hope that whatever we end up with won't be the end-of-democracy-as-we-know-it bill we have now. It might not even be as bad as the DMCA, and the internet survived that one. But it'll still be bad legislation, because the very principle behind it is trying to solve the wrong problem the wrong way.

As flawed as the DMCA is, it still has some give and take. It has safe harbor clauses that actually helped sites like youtube to operate unhindered. SOPA is completely one sided.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[genner]

It is a portmanteu of IRaq and AfghanistAN.

That would be Iraqistan.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

If SOPA is problematic, that has to be for specific reasons - not just because of its name or because (in agreement with all the rest of US law) it makes copyright infringement illegal.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[berashith]

Or maybe even if it is veto-proof, our leader could, well , you know.. LEAD or something. Veto the damn thing if you dont like it, and it could be that others may change their vote if they see that someone is willing to start things in motion. If everyone believes that they will be alone in opposition, then the safe move is to not oppose. All these paid off crooks could go back to their bosses and show that they voted yes on the first pass, but things just werent going to work out.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[shutdown -p now]

Was there any petition there that got a reply different from "thanks for sharing your ideas, but there's no way in hell we're going to change things the way you want"?

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[SeaFox]

That would be Iraqistan.

Say, that's catchy.

Is it too late to get the democracies we set up there to change the name?

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[modmans2ndcoming]

50 thousand people voted on that poll.... so... how does that make it something that they could not ignore?

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Silentknyght]

They could have ignored the issue entirely if they were planning to let it pass. It is not like this issue is something covered on Fox ...

Of course Fox isn't going to cover it. I gotta support any action of the Prez that Murdoch hates, really.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/01/15/murdoch_twitter_rant_sopa/

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[PyroMosh]

NDAA is not a good comparison to this legislation.

The NDAA is considered "must pass" legislation. While we can't know for sure what the President would have done had a bill landed on his desk separate from the NDAA, which included its controversial provisions, we do know that they cited the "must pass" nature of NDAA as the reason they reluctantly signed it into law.

This legislation, however is not attached to anything of the sort. It will pass or fail on its own merits. Congress can't use this as pressure, and the White House can't use it as an excuse.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Igarden2]

"ignores due process" ?
I'm sure the white house would never allow that.
Except in the NDAA when detaining American citizens indefinitely without ....
No, wait...

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Cute: https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/actually-take-these-petitions-seriously-instead-just-using-them-excuse-pretend-you-are-listening/grQ9mNkN

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Alex Belits]

If SOPA is problematic, that has to be for specific reasons - not just because of its name or because (in agreement with all the rest of US law) it makes copyright infringement illegal.

No law can make copyright infringement illegal because copyright infringement is already illegal. If this is the only excuse for some new law, then the law is worthless no matter what is in it.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Khyber]

Nope, not one single one, and even then, several of those got answered not at all, but merely 'set aside.'

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Ginger Unicorn]

strangely, despite reaching the threshold for a response, it has received no response from the white house.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Mmmm ...

The government represents corporate America ... not the American people
Corporate American is destitute of ideas, initiative and enterprise ... and its business models include the American people picking up the tab to ensure that profit continues to be made. (Rather than change the business models ... which would require some thought on behalf of the overpaid, well bonused suits who must tie their annual remuneration to some other nebulous criteria than profit, shareholder value or whatever as a justification for what they get.)
So, government picks up the tab ... pays trillions to 'private industry' and the finance sector, takes on the costs of enforcing individual copyright, plugs the gaping holes in their respective business models
And somebody in the White House makes soothing noises, as yet another violation of individual freedoms and rights makes it onto the Cogressional or Executive record, stating that they don't support this particular instance.
The only difference this time is that they're not using the 'terrorism', 'security' or Osama to justify this particular abrogation of individual rights or citizens.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Digital Vomit]

You know things are bad when we start talking about the DMCA in a positive sense with respect to newly proposed legislation.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Your comment stands to reason as this has been happening a fair amount lately.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone mod this up. Some commenters are too stupid to do their own research to find this out.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Ihmhi]

Frankly, I'm starting to think it won't pass at all, given the momentum the opposition has been building lately.

Don't think that until the vote actually fails.

Don't think that until several months or years after the vote actually fails.

Look what they did with the bank bailouts. The people said no, Congress listened... and then voted it in anyway quickly and quietly not too much later.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Alsee]

It is not like this issue is something covered on Fox and MSNBC and CNN.

Actually I did see CNN run a segment on SOPA. I wish I had a tape of it to give a better evaluation of the segment, but I'll give the basic impression I had from it. It seemed rather slanted to me. They spend most of the segment talking about how SOPA was a law to protect American jobs against teh evilz international criminals, mentioned that there was controversy over the bill between the Big Media companies and the Big Internet companies, and they wrapped up the segment with a rather weak comment against the bill by one of the opponents.

It seems like 90% of the people who learn about SOPA online come to the conclusion that it's a seriously bad law. My guess is that most people who saw the segment on CNN would have considered the controversy pretty boring and trivial, and probably gotten the impression that the bill was pretty much neutral or perhaps beneficial.

-

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Alsee]

You mean Iraqi-aki-aki-aki-stan-stan?

P.S.
I love how Herman Cain still picked up over 200 primary votes. lolz

-

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[evansvillelinux]

You know things are bad when we start talking about the DMCA in a positive sense with respect to newly proposed legislation.

What's funny is that I pretty much said the exact same thing to an Indie Musician organization I belong to just yesterday.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[MysteriousPreacher]

It is rather pointless. The petition to have "under God" removed from the pledge is a good example of how seriously they take these things.

https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/edit-pledge-allegiance-remove-phrase-under-god/v5J2fC6z?utm_source=wethepeople&utm_medium=response&utm_campaign=undergod

In this petition, it's asked that the phrase "under God" be removed, as it's arguably a violation of the first amendment. The first issue was the person chosen to respond to this request: Joshua DuBois, the head of the Office of Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Slight bias here, given that DuBois heads-up a department that was itself a flagrant violation of separation of church and state. His answer was an exercise in contradictory hand waving and trying to deny that it's stupid to that a multi-cultural nation, with a pretty strong constitutional protection against religion infecting government, should keep a 1950s addition to the pledge that says that the country is subservient to the Christian god. Yeah, Hindus and stuff are welcome in America, so long as they accept that their elephant guy and the chick with the arms are not running shit here. Personally I don't see the pledge as being a pressing issue - there are far more egregious violations of the first amendment, such as the tax breaks that churches get just by virtue of being religious.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[mjr167]

Doesn't that indicate a problem with the system if ANY bill can be "must pass"? If I tacked on a clause to your electric bill saying "by paying this bill you agree to sell yourself into slavery but if you don't pay it I'll turn off your lights," we would call that extortion.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[PyroMosh]

Yes, it is a problem. I agree, these riders are usually a problem.

But my point stands that this bill is different from NDAA. SOPA will have to stand or fall on its own, because it is a stand alone bill.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[MacWiz]

I thought the most important part of the White House response was this:

So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Don’t limit your opinion to what’s the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what’s right. Already, many members of Congress are asking for public input around the issue. We are paying close attention to those opportunities, as well as to public input to the Administration.

One would think slashdot should be a perfect forum to gnash out a reasonable approach to the piracy issue. If we keep letting the RIAA/MPAA craft laws, they're always going to be crap because the MAFIAA never considers the ramifications beyond their own desires. Techies have to solve this problem.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Golddess]

there are far more egregious violations of the first amendment

While I agree with you, I'm a little confused about why you chose an example that isn't a violation of the first amendment. I mean, I'm an atheist, and I can pretty easily see how one could make the argument that taxing churches violates the right to freedom of religion, as only those with enough money would be allowed to worship.

Though then you've got the situation of letting the government define what is and is not religion, and in essence, violating the right to freedom of religion of anyone not practicing an "approved" religion. So I guess I can see your side of it too.

Not advocating any particular side, just thinking out loud.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[MysteriousPreacher]

Yep, the issue with having the state being the arbiter of true religion is one of the more intractable issues with providing tax benefits to religions for being religions. I'm fine with a level playing field in which a church and a secular community club operate by the same set of rules when seeking tax exempt status. I think a reasonable argument could be made that churches can and do perform a useful function in their communities, even if I believe that their belief system is baloney. The state can't possible come up with a checklist that would apply to all religions without discriminating against the more unconventional ones.

On taxing being a restriction on religion, it's no more restrictive than prohibiting prayer meetings on a busy highway, or arresting a Sadhu holy man for going for a naked stroll. Providing tax exempt status to religions is the state involving itself in the establishment of religion. Religions shouldn't be treated any better or any worse than secular groups. It seems obscene to me that religious organizations can not only be tax exempt, like secular groups, but can also be free from the burden of having to file tax returns. Scientology is the elephant in the room when examine the opaque nature of some religious organizations.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[modmans2ndcoming]

Do they have to allow due process for a US citizen captured in a battlefield fighting against the US Military? that is what NDAA allows.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[modmans2ndcoming]

What would be cool is if Slashdot create a forum like story where we could think tank these issues. Sort of like Slashdot interviews, but rather than the person we solicit be given our highest modded questions, we set it up so they bring us a problem and after think tanking on it for a while, we send them the top what ever solutions....I think it would need more time on the front page and some better tools for the revising work, but I think that is a task that we could perform admirably.... crowd source those solutions baby!

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Trilkin]

Dude with arms. Shiva's a dude to the Hindus. Unrelated to the stripper ice queen in Final Fantasy.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[Igarden2]

The statute is particularly dangerous because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be used by this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any battlefield. - Anthony D. Romero, ACLU executive director.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[MysteriousPreacher]

My bad; I was confused by Shiva's moobs.

Re:They can say they oppose it,

[modmans2ndcoming]

it certainly does have temporal and geographic limitations.... the military is the one who has jurisdiction in this legislation, thus it can not be in the US states or territories. It must also be a location that the military has been given authorization of force to operate against Hostile forces, so it can not be in some base in Germany or Japan, it must be during a military action.

your argument is based on someone's statement... I read the bill and it is pretty clear where this action can be taken and by whom it may be taken by.

No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Zondar]

I think he just lost a bunch of campaign contributions with that blog.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[bs0d3]

nah his blog was vague enough to make both sides happy, he never says that he opposes SOPA

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, like they're going to give him LESS money. A slight non-committal response like this is a pathway to more money, not less.

And the Republicans would get behind the Evangelical Crusade to burn Hollywood to the Ground, so they're not even slightly appealing.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[modmans2ndcoming]

where is the WH statement vague? They support legislation to stop foreign piracy on the internet. They do not support all the moronic crap in SOPA that would allow entrenched business interests to shut down any site they want by nodding at an ISP via breaking the way the internet is built to work.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Ethanol-fueled]

What will happen is that Supreme Leader Baraq Hussein Sotero will "reluctantly" sign the bill no matter what, just like he "reluctantly" signed the NDAA.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well aren't you just a racist cockbag.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Chewbacon]

As he's already in office, that'll make this run cheaper for him. Now, it would be smarter for a GOP candidate to support it unconditionally.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Runaway1956]

I dunno - maybe Ethanol is racist, maybe he isn't. But, Obama DID "reluctantly" sign that fucking NDAA, did he not? Ethanol's point stands, racist cockbag or not.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[petman]

I think he just lost a bunch of bribes with that blog.

FTFY.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[artor3]

It was passed by a veto proof majority. Refusing to sign it would have been an empty gesture, and would have allowed Republicans to run ads against him stating that he vetoed health care for wounded veterans.

So no, his point does not stand. And FYI, when someone uses the phrase "Supreme Leader Baraq Hussein Sotero", there is no "maybe" about their racism.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, yes, the time-honored tradition of calling somebody a "racist" because you disagree with them. Listen up, sockpuppet - had I used the n-word, the phrase "dune c**n," or even the word "monkey," to describe Obama, then yes, you would have credible grounds to label me a racist.

However, I was actually lampooning racists by using those terms, an obvious fact which flew right over your head. You are not of the proper intellectual calibre Slashdot discussions require. I suggest you spend more time at Reddit or Digg, where you will be welcomed with open arms.

-- Ethanol-fueled

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[damn_registrars]

I think he just lost a bunch of campaign contributions with that blog.

Not that it matters. The GOP can't find a candidate who can defeat Obama in 2012 anyways. None of the candidates who have a remote chance of winning the nomination are demonstrably more conservative than the actions of President Barack "lawnchair" Obama. If Hollywood completely turned off the tap, Obama could still phone in his re-election campaign and win it easily.

The real loss here, though, is that some people will vote for Obama expecting something to change, in spite of the fact that since 2008 (and really, much further back than that) nothing has.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[betterunixthanunix]

You do not think that this counts as a change:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act_for_Fiscal_Year_2012

I guess "continuing to lose rights and freedoms" might not be a second order change (i.e. the rate of change remains unchanged).

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[artor3]

You were not "lampooning" racists. There was nothing sarcastic about your statement, nor was there any indication that you didn't mean what you said. You're simply backpedaling now, perhaps out of shame, but more likely because you wanted an opportunity to show how awesome and high minded you are (unlike those yokels at Reddit amirite?).

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Grave]

Empty gesture? No, it would have been saying "I do not give a fuck about stupid politics, and would prefer to stick to my guns about something that really matters for a change."

When you act out of concern for your re-election rather than what is best for the nation, you are acting as a traitor to your country.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[damn_registrars]

I guess "continuing to lose rights and freedoms" might not be a second order change (i.e. the rate of change remains unchanged).

Even more so. the direction of change remains unchanged. President Lawnchair has yet to do a single thing as POTUS that his predecessor would not have done as well.

Not. One. Thing.

And being as conservatives rallied around his predecessor as a great conservative, and are trying to emulate him, they will completely and utterly fail to differentiate themselves from Obama. Hence unless they are counting on bringing all the racists out of the woodwork who will vote for anyone in order to get the black guy out of the white house, the republicans are doomed to fail this round because they sure as hell can't win on policy.

Although, there is one last thing the GOP can hope for. The democrats excel at snatching failure from the jaws of victory, and hence may find a way to blow this on their own.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[shutdown -p now]

It was passed by a veto proof majority. Refusing to sign it would have been an empty gesture

Not all gestures are empty. Sometimes it is important to have it be known what you stand for.

What you're saying, basically, is that Obama has said "fuck you" to everyone who disagrees with NDAA, to appease a bunch of Republican nutjobs who hate him anyway. I don't even see how this could possibly be smart in any sense.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[edremy]

I guess "continuing to lose rights and freedoms" might not be a second order change (i.e. the rate of change remains unchanged).

Even more so. the direction of change remains unchanged. President Lawnchair has yet to do a single thing as POTUS that his predecessor would not have done as well. Not. One. Thing.

Repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell.

There's one. There are a lot of others. Yes, he's a moderate Republican, but moderate Republicans aren't welcome in the modern Republican party.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[luther349]

why would it matter at this point hes not going to get a second term anyways because of the healthcare disaster and utter failer to really change anything. Republicans are know they are getting in this year without much effort because the sheep are to stupid to see there just as bad as the other guy.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[damn_registrars]

I guess "continuing to lose rights and freedoms" might not be a second order change (i.e. the rate of change remains unchanged).

Even more so. the direction of change remains unchanged. President Lawnchair has yet to do a single thing as POTUS that his predecessor would not have done as well. Not. One. Thing.

Repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell.

That repeal was required in order to sustain the war efforts that the republicans support. Eventually the armed services would have been too tapped out without allowing openly homosexual troops to serve. While the conservatives hate homosexuality, they love war enough to overlook it. And besides, there are plenty of economically disadvantaged homosexuals who could serve in the place of their own silver spoon children once DADT is repealed.

I'm willing to say with confidence that had a bill been authored to repeal it while GWB was still in office, he would have signed it. He just didn't make it an issue while he was running. Now in the third Bush administration, it has been done.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Carewolf]

No, it just says that it won't support SOPA if it does such a thing. Then again, only IT expert could testify to SOPA having those consequences, and without expert testimonials, they could easily sign the SOPA and still claim ignorance by stating: That is not the intended purpose of SOPA - Just like congress does.

This is an intentionally vague response.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Kjella]

That repeal was required in order to sustain the war efforts that the republicans support. Eventually the armed services would have been too tapped out without allowing openly homosexual troops to serve.

Lol what? Around 5% or so is gay/bisexual and that doesn't count those already serving without being open about it. They employ 1.5 million people and never in the last 10 years have they lost even 0,1% of that. Maybe if the US was in the middle of WWII your post could have made slightly more sense, but they're neither running out of bodies nor would abolishing DADT provide more than a few percent increase. But keep on dreaming that it would have happened without "President Lawnchair"...

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't say n-word. Just say nigger. Saying n-word has the same effect as the word nigger to the person you're saying it to.

If the US could realize this, then they'd take another step towards racial desegregation.

Fucking idiots.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[damn_registrars]

They employ 1.5 million people and never in the last 10 years have they lost even 0,1% of that.

Are you talking about casualties or declining enrolment numbers?

Nonetheless, the recruitment numbers for the US armed forces have been suffering, ever since the country realized that we were lead into a war in Iraq on a massive pack of lies and dragged through it with no end game whatsoever. Anyone who has had their eyes and ears open in the past decade or so knows that the armed forces have had to constantly reduce their recruitment goals, while simultaneously reducing their criteria for acceptance, just to put up the numbers they have posted lately.

Which is utterly pathetic, considering how awful the job market is. You no longer even need a GED to sign up in the army. You can even get in with criminal offenses on your record that used to automatically disqualify you. Yet even with those barriers to entry removed, some unemployed people would still rather take their chances at home than volunteer to be cannon fodder in a war that we never should have started.

But keep on dreaming that it would have happened without "President Lawnchair"...

It was the next logical step to get enrolment up to where the armed services needed it.

Re:No Hollywood money for Obama 2012...

[modmans2ndcoming]

you are pretending that it is vague. It isn't.

And the president has no excuses because he has a three people (who signed the response) who know better about these issues.

Yes they oppose it...

[Anonymous Coward]

but will they do anything about it? I've seen very little to lead me to believe that the democrats are any less in the pocket of the copyright lobby than the republicans.

Dupe

[bonch]

This is a dupe of yesterday's article.

Re:Dupe

[artor3]

Only this time, it's being spun in the opposite direction. Yesterday's was spun to make it sound like Obama supports SOPA, which was odd because every other site I read inferred that he opposed it.

Re:Dupe

[zixxt]

Its not a dupe, its a retelling of the story!

Re:Dupe

[bonch]

It wasn't spun to make it sound like he supported it; it was pointed out that the White House supported anti-piracy measures and simply opposed certain provisions in this one, meaning he could still approve the legislation once those provisions were addressed.

Hell, it might even just be a token opposition designed to appeal to his supporters but ultimately won't stop the bill. Obama has done that before, declaring that he has "serious reservations" about something he's willingly signing into law. He's kind of an ass like that.

Re:Dupe

[artor3]

The NDAA has to be signed into law. It funds the entire military. If he vetoed it, we'd spend the rest of the year watching non-stop ads about how he took away healthcare from wounded veterans and refused to give guns to troops on the front lines. He'd lose reelection in the biggest landslide in history, because frankly, the average voter is woefully uninformed. So to say he "willingly" signed it into law is a vast oversimplification.

SOPA isn't a big omnibus bill. If he opposes provisions in it, he can veto it without all the collateral damage. And it's not like there were specific things he opposed that could be taken out. It was a pretty broad statement: "we will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global internet." You'd basically need a complete rewrite to avoid doing any of those things.

Re:Dupe

[bonch]

The NDAA has to be signed into law. It funds the entire military. If he vetoed it, we'd spend the rest of the year watching non-stop ads about how he took away healthcare from wounded veterans and refused to give guns to troops on the front lines. He'd lose reelection in the biggest landslide in history, because frankly, the average voter is woefully uninformed. So to say he "willingly" signed it into law is a vast oversimplification.

Good thing Obama cared more about his re-election than his serious reservations.

Re:Dupe

[Lumpy]

No it did not. Stop with that lying FUD.

if he vetoed it you actually think the military would stop instantly? That is the single most stupid comment anyone could think.

If he vetoed it, Congress would have been FORCED to get off their asses and come up with a honest bill.

Re:Dupe

[artor3]

If he vetoed it, it would have passed anyway, because it was passed by a veto proof majority.

Please at least try to learn about these issues before coming to your conclusions. Congress would not have been forced to do anything.

Re:Dupe

[amiga3D]

I think someone forgot to give the President his cut.

Re:Dupe

[phantomfive]

If he vetoed it, we'd spend the rest of the year watching non-stop ads about how he took away healthcare from wounded veterans and refused to give guns to troops on the front lines.

Obama doesn't know how to counter that kind of political attack? Then either he is an incompetent politician, or he didn't really care about NDAA. My guess is on the latter.

Re:Dupe

[bonch]

The issue isn't necessarily that he signed the bill. It's that he expressed "serious reservations" as he signed it, as if he wants to be able to appease people who don't like the bill while also appeasing those who do by signed it. As is often the case with this president, he wants it both ways. That is why he's an ass.

He should have said nothing.

Re:Dupe

[Stormthirst]

I don't understand the finer points of your legal system, seeing as I'm not an American.

If they have a veto proof majority, what would happen if he refused to sign it into law? Does it become law anyway?

Re:Dupe

[Whiteox]

Because I don't know, but isn't it common practice for bills to include riders or laws that are lumped in together? So unpopular or unethical laws get passed because they are included in the main bill? Is that what this is about?

Re:Dupe

[Anonymous Coward]

There are three actions a president can do when faced with a new bill. He can sign it, and it becomes law. He can ignore it, and after a period, it becomes law as if he signed it. Or he can veto it. If he vetoes it, the veto can be overturned by a super majority in the House and Senate. If that happens, it becomes law.

Re:Dupe

[kroyd]

Or, if you pay a bit of attention: The indefinite detention paragraphs are most likely illegal under the US constitution. By noting his reservations the comming court cases (appeals all the way up to the supreme court) will be quite a bit simpler. After all, it is the executive branch (where the president is), which has to prosecute in favour of the law, and the president stating reservations is a boon to any defense attorney. This is obvious, and has been covered in the news, but hey, most people complaning doesn't seem to know what the NDAA act really is.
The court cases, in case you don't know, will be judged by the judiciary part of the US system. Of course, if you and the republicans get their way the next president will be a republican, and the one or two new supreme court justices which will be appointed in the next presidential period will be really, really conservative. Then, the indefinite detention will most likely become law.
I'm not an American, but this should be obvious even with the most cursory glance.

Re:Dupe

[betterunixthanunix]

The NDAA has to be signed into law. It funds the entire military

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_junta

Re:Dupe

[Anonymous Coward]

I realize that Obama supporters desperately need to portray everything Obama does as amazing and awesome, but merely expressing reservations doesn't magically make it easier for defense attorneys. As you point out, the court cases will be judge by the judicial branch, so it matters even less if Obama expresses reservations.

Re:Dupe

[Anonymous Coward]

The insidiousness of the law in question is that it puts into question if there even *will be a court case*. If civilian courts can be avoided, civilians do not have all their rights. Yes, military courts are bound by some rules, but they are not bound by all the rules civilian courts are, and the different rules make it easier to ignore the rights of the accused.

And a law's constitutionality unfortunately is academic if you are unable to challenge it in court.

Re:Dupe

[Zenin]

Obama only opposed the original language of the NDAA which limited executive power wrt indefinite detention. Obama never opposed the indefinite detention provisions...he specifically asked for them!

Obama was only ever going to veto NDAA if it in any way limited the executive's already far overreaching powers, full stop.

Re:Dupe

[makomk]

Which fool decided to exempt military courts from habeas corpus anyway? That was probably a disaster waiting to happen from the start...

Re:Dupe

[Bob9113]

If he vetoed it, we'd spend the rest of the year watching non-stop ads about how he took away healthcare from wounded veterans

Just want to be sure I'm reading this right -- Are you saying that it is OK for an elected official to support a bill that violates the clear intent of The Constitution if he or she thinks it will make it easier to get re-elected?

Are you also saying that "I must stand on The Constitution" is a tune that won't play in the media right now? Ron Paul, who is as batty as a fruitcake, is getting national attention with little more substance than a genuine (albeit flawed) belief in The Constitution.

Sorry, those are kind of rhetorical questions, and I hate rhetoric, but I'm having a hard time framing it in a better way. Just, please, think about the long-term costs of accepting the less-wrong thing on an iterative basis. When do we pull out? When do we start getting back to being America again? When do we stop being puppets to the military industrial complex? If not the guy who was clearly elected on the plank of breaking that chain, then who?

Are we on an unstoppable downward slide?

If we are, then can't we at least have some noble sacrifice on the way down, to let us know that there is some honor left? If we're going down either way, can't we at least see an occasional flash of dignity? Or is it just "Screw it, I'm not giving up my cush job for nothin'."

Re:Dupe

[Anonymous Coward]

That's right.

From Article I of the Constitution: "Every Order, Resolution, or Vote... (except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the United States; and before the Same shall take Effect, shall be approved by him, or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives..."

How I like it!

[Anonymous Coward]

She forced me to consume chocolate chip cookies and pocket knives. It was then that she forced me to vomit up a giant chocolate chip cookie that looked as if it had been partially digested. She went out on my porch, showed the delicious cookie to the world, and began eating it.

Then she sucked me into the skin on her stomach but left my ass hanging out. She then turned my ass into a coin purse, went into a store, bought something, and began paying off the $1000 bill... in pennies! Each time she pulled a penny out of my ass, it tickled horribly!

Paywall

[Anonymous Coward]

The article is behind a paywall, anyone got a link to the blog post?

Re:Paywall

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog

Wikimedia still discussing

[symbolset]

But it looks like a click-through to access the site on the 18th and a banner on every page for a couple weeks. That's about as much as Wiki can do, as they're pretty essential. No word yet on Google. Facebook has scheduled a press event for the day, but no clue whether it's related.

More and more big sites are getting in on the game.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[Black Parrot]

More and more big sites are getting in on the game.

Slashdot?

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[sqlrob]

That's about as much as Wiki can do, as they're pretty essential

That's the freaking POINT of making it an utter blackout. Make people understand what it would be like if it passed. A click through isn't going to change squat.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[symbolset]

Actually I misread that. Sentiment is running in favor of full blackout - no posting, editing or reading of articles for all of English Wikipedia for the full 12-hour period Wednesday, by a ratio of 5:1 over the soft blackout option. There is also support for a blackout of all of Wiki worldwide, but just a wee bit less. And it's approved by the legal team. It looks like Wednesday's going to be a no-Wikipedia day.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[sqlrob]

Oh, good.

A clickthrough blackout in the rest of the world isn't a bad idea though.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[Anonymous Coward]

The correct link to the full blackout option at wikipedia.org is here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Action#Full_blackout

Please share with everyone.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[M. Baranczak]

The people who read Slashdot have already heard of SOPA, and already have an opinion of it. So I don't see the point.

Re:Wikimedia still discussing

[symbolset]

They're working on that. Some foreign language versions may blackout entirely. For sure there will be anti-SOPA headers on all of Wikipedia worldwide.

why did this shitty summary get posted???

[sribe]

Seriously, this is news that deserves to be on slashdot. But a link to an article behind a paywall, which just gets a popup pushing subscriptions, is NOT the proper way to submit this story!

Re:why did this shitty summary get posted???

[bonch]

Fear not, for it was already submitted yesterday with a direct link to the White House's statement. As stated then, the White House gave itself leeway to approve the legislation if the key objections were addressed, so don't think this means the legislation will go away.

Re:why did this shitty summary get posted???

[modmans2ndcoming]

considering all adults in the world oppose SOPA because of the key issues that are in the WH statement, why wouldn't president Obama sign such a modified bill?

Re:why did this shitty summary get posted???

[bonch]

It's a massive assumption on your part to presume that "all adults" oppose SOPA. The majority of Americans probably have never even heard of it.

Re:why did this shitty summary get posted???

[Runaway1956]

You need some serious qualifications to your statement, regarding all adults. The vast majority of adults - people, actually - have no clue to the remifications of SOPA. No clue at all. Those who have a couple of clues have arrived at their opinions based on the word of some stooge whom they like - be that stooge on Fox News, or CNN, or Turner broadcasting. Hell, some brainless twat on American Idol could voice an opinion, and sway a decent percentage of the public with that opinion.

Now, had you said "all informed adults with any technical background, who lack any financial interest in the issue", then you might have been correct.

Re:why did this shitty summary get posted???

[modmans2ndcoming]

you are right, I did not communicate what I actually meant... "all adults int he world that oppose SOPA" is what I meant to say.

Will not support, but will sign into law anyway.

[hawks5999]

With a meaningless signing statement of course.

Hey!!

[jamstar7]

Dupe much?

So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

So there are dupes. There will always be dupes. Dupes are good filler when the news gets slow, and pull more click-throughs to appreciative sites, so slashdot has every incentive to post dupes.

Pointing out that it is a dupe won't make the flow of dupes stop. Also, people who didn't read the original post don't care that it is a dupe, since they are reading it for the first time. People who DID read the original post also don't care, because they already know it is a dupe.

So why does everybody have to shout "dupe! dupe! OMG DUPE!" every time this happens?

Slashdot readers should be accustomed to dupes by now.

Re:So what?

[bonch]

So why does everybody have to shout "dupe! dupe! OMG DUPE!" every time this happens?

Because something new and relevant could have been posted in its place.

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

So there are people who post "Dupe". There will always be people who post "Dupe". "Dupes" are good filler when the comments get slow, or haven't started yet, so slashdot has every incentive for people to post "Dupe".

Pointing out that pointing out that it is a dupe won't make the flow of people who post "Dupe" stop. Also, people who set their threshold at 4 don't care that someone posted "Dupe", since they have read "Dupe" before. People who set their threshold at -1 also don't care, because they are used to "Dupe" posts.

So, why does everybody have to shout 'Stop posting "Dupe"! Stop posting "Dupe"! OMG Stop posting "DUPE" every time this happens?

Slashdot readers should be accustomed to people posting "Dupe" by now.

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

So there are dupes. There will always be dupes. Dupes are good filler when the news gets slow, and pull more click-throughs to appreciative sites, so slashdot has every incentive to post dupes. Pointing out that it is a dupe won't make the flow of dupes stop. Also, people who didn't read the original post don't care that it is a dupe, since they are reading it for the first time. People who DID read the original post also don't care, because they already know it is a dupe. So why does everybody have to shout "dupe! dupe! OMG DUPE!" every time this happens? Slashdot readers should be accustomed to dupes by now.

Re:So what?

[Runaway1956]

So - post something bonch. And, please, try not to post more shill shit when you do it.

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

As we all know, there's only so much space on the internet. The dupes clog up the tubes and don't let the good stories through.

Re:So what?

[bonch]

I submit content all the time.

Re:So what?

[Overly Critical Guy]

Are you one of those angry fanboys with Asperger's who thinks anything even remotely critical of Google shouldn't be allowed on Slashdot? Seriously, Android fanboys are even more obnoxiously closed-minded than Apple fanboys.

Re:So what?

[bonch]

With the glacial pace that Slashdot posts stories, and the fact that they often appeared days earlier on other sites anyway, yeah, dupes do clog up the tubes a bit.

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice!

bonch supporting bonch; why does bonch need more than one account?

just to be clear bonch=Overly Critical Guy

just to be clear Overly Critical Guy=bonch

and bonch wonders why he gets downmodded

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Prove it.

Re:So what?

[Overly Critical Guy]

This isn't bonch. Going by post history, he's getting upmodded, not downmodded. Aren't you Galestar/NicknameOne/flurp who replies to all his posts?

Re:So what?

[inode_buddha]

You forgot M$ fanboys and Republicans. Good effort, though.

Re:So what?

[GreatBunzinni]

For a headsup, the bonch account and Overly Critical Guy accounts are sockpuppets operated by the same organization. See this post and a previous post I've made here for evidence that these user accounts are used to push the same script, sometimes even copy/paste versions of it.

No, The White House Did Not Say

[Anonymous Coward]

http://informationliberation.com/?id=37993

This is merely propaganda doublespeak. Nothing has changed:

from the link above:

The Huffington Post is wrongly reporting the White House will not support SOPA or PIPA. If you read the White House's actual statement, it's full of strongly worded language, but absolutely nowhere does it say they will not support the bills. On the other hand, it does state, "we will continue to work with Congress on a bipartisan basis on legislation that provides new tools needed in the global fight against piracy and counterfeiting."

How anyone could believe the same White House which passed the NDAA into law after claiming they would veto it should be taken by their rhetoric and not even by their word is beyond belief. With the NDAA, Obama was on record saying he would veto the legislation, this statement from the White House says they're in full support of passing copyright crackdown bills, but they must "defend an open Internet based on the values of free expression, privacy, security and innovation."

That's pure rhetoric (and it's contradictory on its face).

The author of the White House's statement, Obama's 'IP czar' Victoria Espinel, has already overseen the seizures of hundreds of websites without any due process, including websites which were deemed legal by their own respective countries. This White House is actively engaged in violating our internet freedoms, to completely ignore this attack on internet freedom and turn around and take a vaguely worded statement promising nothing as an explicit denouncement of these censorship bills is foolish and naive to the extreme.

The only concrete information to come out from the White House's statement is they will move forward "on legislation that provides new tools needed in the global fight against piracy and counterfeiting."

That means the current censorship supporting DMCA laws are not enough, the current unconstitutional seizures of hundreds of websites without due process is not enough, they want even more power and they're expecting congress and the internet community to get in line and give it to them.

Update: There is one policy statement in her writing where she says the White House will not support DNS blocking, that provision was already removed from the SOPA bill yesterday, so it changes nothing.

Deep Reservations

[Anonymous Coward]

And now, with deep reservations, Obama can sign it into law.

Under the SOPA costgo, EBay, Costco can be shut

[Joe_Dragon]

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111005/10082416208/monster-cable-claims-ebay-craigslist-costco-sears-are-rogue-sites.shtml

monster cable may even try to take down monoprice as well.

Not really

[Mathinker]

> Is this an example of our 3-part government actually working as intended?

No, not really. "As intended" would mean that:

• The branches of government would be trying to optimize for the good of society.
• The public would be informed enough to think about what was good for them in the long term, and vote accordingly.

Instead we have:

• The public is excessively swayed by whatever they see in the popular media.
• The branches of government optimize for maximizing their chances of re-election.

Lip service for Obamites

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the sound of elections nearing...

Re:Lip service for Obamites

[Black Parrot]

It's the sound of elections nearing...

Really? I thought maybe they read yesterday's Slashdot posts and acquired a clue.

[Warning: be wary of that whooshing sound you may be hearing right now.]

Heh.

[Black Parrot]

I love the cookie I'm getting both for this and the DHS X-Ray article:

Hacker's Law: The belief that enhanced understanding will necessarily stir a nation to action is one of mankind's oldest illusions.

Re:Heh.

[Thing 1]

OT: it's a fortune, not a cookie. (Yes, I know, the origin is "fortune cookie"; however, the term for the text at the bottom of the page is "fortune"; the term for text that you can't see, which the site uses to watch how you visit, that's called a "cookie".)

Re:Will not support, but will sign into law anyway

[Anonymous Coward]

Not at all. This will provide the current administration with a chance to blame another law they willingly pass through as having no alternative in the face of Republican dirty tricks. While it doesn't make much sense to anyone who can follow the bouncing ball, there will be enough voters to eat it up to make it worthwhile.

-1 Troll?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is this modded down as troll? It IS a dupe. Are the moderators on crack today?

This is the beginning of the new government

[Okian Warrior]

No, this is not our 3-part government working as expected, it's the new style of government aborning. With the rise of the internet and ubiquitous communications, the public at last has a way to influence government decisions.

We see it here in its early form.

At the moment the effect is fairly weak - Obama is only taking a position because he wants public support for reelection.

But despite self-serving motives, he is taking notice and he is opposing legislation, largely because of widespread grassroots opposition.

This will be the wave of the future. If community opinion, widely distributed and echoed on the internet, can presage community action, it will become increasingly difficult for political corruption. Corporations and politicians will be unable to do "bad" things for fear of being discovered by hackers, publicized by social media, and punished by public backlash.

It's the new boss. Curiously different from the old boss.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[bananaquackmoo]

You're such an optimist sir. I wish I could share in your optimism.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[jmerlin]

The entire point of the President's veto capability was specifically for cases where the executive branch disagrees with the legislative. What the big corporate interests paid for when they paid to have Obama made president (and would've been the same of McCain, it's easy to make people think they have a choice when you control both of the choices) was a president who appeals to the people but really doesn't stand in the way of their majority ownership of the legislative branch.

Unfortunately, tyranny has never gone silently, as you suggest. When (not if) revolution happens in our country, there will be consequences for those involved, and there will be blood. It will not be a silent revolution done over the internets. The fact that now 4 different bills have been proposed and have "approval" from the executive and legislative branches that would permit wholesale censorship of the internet should convince you of that.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[Anonymous Coward]

A bit of advice, take your meds and put your tin foil hat back on, the gamma waves have corrupted your thinking process.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[jmerlin]

Billions of people worldwide do work they don't particularly like for money. For small sums of money, too. The hundreds of millions of campaign contributions I can very easily see as public record given to these people followed by their $700,000+ /yr jobs in the private sector after they retire can't possibly indicate that the same applies. Given enough money, most people do what they're told. This is completely valid and actually correct thinking. The tinfoil hat is when you talk about the corporations planning some kind of NWO, but really it's about control to kill competition and remain absurdly profitable with govt. assistance. It's called tyranny. You might want to read up in some history books.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[Anonymous Coward]

You might want to talk to your doctor about increasing your dosage, the medication has clearly failed you.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[Anonymous Coward]

"new style"
Eh?
This is how government was first born.
Government was born out of collaboration between separate groups who themselves had a governor or related person of authority.
They were a tool of the people to carry out their will on a larger scale than that of a single governer / local council.

But it got corrupted down the line, like all governments. It turned in to a secret society where they tried to control the society that elected them without them realizing. Back-alley agreements, secrecy, spying and all that lovely stuff.
Now, they can't really hide anything and are hating it.

Things have changed drastically the past couple decades because of things that have happened, not just in America, but in the UK, Europe, Russia and plenty of other countries.
But the government don't want an open government. Not now. Not with all the crap that goes on behind the scenes in order to keep countries from going full-out war with each other, the amount of cock-suckery and back-stabbing, the deception.
Anyone else notice Obama when entire soul just exploded in half when he finally got in to office and seen how shit a state America was in?
All that passion and enthusiasm gone in an instant. He was at the top and could see how royally screwed it was. Being at the top can crush even the best of people.
You can see it in his facial expressions every day now. He has to put on a brave face for America, because even he is uncertain of its future.

Re:This is the beginning of the new government

[rastoboy29]

Dream on.

Well.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Constitution is just a damned piece of paper, after all.

Bitch needs to go.

Pity that it looks like Obama will simply be replaced by a bitch of equal or greater value.

Bla bla bla hot air

[nurb432]

its just 'big words from people that don't understand what the hell they are taking about'. You can tell its an election year. Feed the people whatever crap you need to in order to get (re)elected. They have no intention of 'protecting' anything, other than their power and revenue.

Registration Required

[eriklou]

Love how you have to be registered with that site to read it. STOP POSTING REGISTERED LINKS!

Re:Registration Required

[BlueCoder]

I concur. Stop promoting these sites.

Re:Registration Required

[Anonymous Coward]

You know it's slashdot when even the submitter doesn't RTFA

Captcha: Despots

Disproportionate influence

[mykos]

Why do a few corporations supporting it have equal influence to thousands of individuals corporations? Are we just not paying the right people?

Obama supporter addresses this issue...

[voss]

I sent an email to the president that I contributed $300 in 2008, and $50 so far in 2012
but if he signs either SOPA or Protect IP, the campaign wont get another dime from me. I suspect Im not the only
one who feels this way.

Re:Obama supporter addresses this issue...

[betterunixthanunix]

You may not have noticed, by the Obama administration is full of people who have ties to Hollywood. What reason is there to think that he will not sign the bill into law?

Wake up -- the Democrats are just as quick to ignore individual rights as the Republicans are, they just have a different (but not even close to disjoint) set of corporations that they prefer to give hand-outs to.

Oh wow. Watch what they DO, not what they SAY.

[Colin Smith]

Good lord. The public is owned by the media, they vote the way they are told to vote. They are told red/blue, black/white, oh look Dancing with the Stars!

In the meantime the real power buy their influence in advance. By the time red/blue puppets get into power it's a done deal:

Obama (blue choice of 08):

University of California $1,648,685
Goldman Sachs $1,013,091
Harvard University $878,164
Microsoft Corp $852,167
Google Inc $814,540
JPMorgan Chase & Co $808,799
Citigroup Inc $736,771
Time Warner $624,618

Romney (red choice of 12):

Goldman Sachs $367,200
Credit Suisse Group $203,750
Morgan Stanley $199,800
HIG Capital $186,500
Barclays $157,750
Kirkland & Ellis $132,100
Bank of America $126,500
PriceWaterhouseCoopers $118,250
EMC Corp $117,300
JPMorgan Chase & Co $112,250

Re:Oh wow. Watch what they DO, not what they SAY.

[mhollis]

I note all the numbers from donors this year to Romney are lower. But it's early yet.

Problem is, you're leaving out the SuperPAC money that may very well determine the election. And, of course we cannot trace that. In the case of Ron Paul, we're probably looking at Iran, China and Russia. They would love to see the ultra-isolationist country he's espousing.

With respect to PIPA and SOPA, these are really bad bills. I have talked to two Senate offices and one Representative in person. My Representative was particularly interested in the "no due process" part of the bill, and told me he cannot support it. That is one that has been convinced.

Re:Oh wow. Watch what they DO, not what they SAY.

[phantomfive]

Why did University of California donate to Obama's re-election campaign? Especially when they are raising tuitions?

Re:Oh wow. Watch what they DO, not what they SAY.

[Colin Smith]

Student loans.

HTH.

Obama said he opposed NDAA - but he signed it

[Anonymous Coward]

Obama even agreed to the most horrifying parts of the clearly unconstitutional bill.

Our politicians are just playing games with us, and we allow it.

If a repub had signed it . . .

[walterbyrd]

You would be having a hissy fit.

Obama signed it because he loves it, there can be no other reason.

But NDAA is okay with you?

[walterbyrd]

And no problem that Obama has not kept his campaign promises?

No Legislative Response is Required, or Allowed

[Anonymous Coward]

This is completely outside the realm of any government. THAT is the primary reason that not only must SOPA be thrown out, its devisors should be punished.

"... can't be fooled again!" ?

[J'raxis]

This is the same White House that promised to veto the NDAA, yes?

Re:"... can't be fooled again!" ?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, they never promised that.

Re:"... can't be fooled again!" ?

[J'raxis]

In Reversal of Promised Veto, Obama Expected to Sign Military Detention Bill.

Top Google result for "NDAA veto promise." Google has 1,390,000 other results for you to choose from if you feel like "correcting" someone with incorrect information again.

Doesn't matter any more for me.

[Anonymous Coward]

An action is being decided upon that could take my Internet away, or the way I use it.
The Newsgroups/Usenet will be history, a thing of the past. This put on the table by people
who hold contracts on movies and music

I've never copied or shared music or movies, I'm going to start. If I'm going to be
punished for something I'm not guilty, damn if I'm not going to make up for lost time.

Unexpected but not unusual

[Anonymous Coward]

I have felt like this before, almost every election promises are made and words are spoken that speak to us all and give us all hope that these guys may actually work out well for what we want.

These are encouraging noises, I hope they pan out into even more encouraging actions. Go Obama, I guess.

Free Market Failure or Success?

[Ouchie]

When will the media companies and government realize that the proliferation of piracy is not the internet it is the outrageous prices they try to extract. The fact is that if they didn't keep trying to sell every stinking CD at $17 when we all know most aren't worth $5. Sell the product at what the market wants to pay for it, if you don't then the incentive to steal goes way up.

There have been several recent examples of artists releasing their work at reasonable prices with no DRM. Rather than being ripped off by the public at large, their fans have put down the money.

Louis CK has made over $1,000,000 off his most recent video. You can download it without DRM for $5. And yes he is Hilarious.

Obama Fans

[Anonymous Coward]

Pathetic seeing Obama fans still trying to convince themselves and the people around them that they weren't completely hoodwinked when they cast that vote in 2008 and that they haven't been completely sold out in every manner possible over the last three years. His first two years spent breaking promises and caving (promised Gitmo closure, wouldn't sign any HCR without public option, no HCR mandate) now his last two years a spineless candidate perpetually running for re-election and completely unwilling to take a stand on anything, just as he did in punting Keystone XL and still you think he's going to do something heroic in vetoing whatever version of SOPA arrives at his desk? Pshaw!

Invalid link

[Anonymous Coward]

The link in the article is to payed section.. thus invalid.

Can't open the article

[Anonymous Coward]

Asks for account info and then redirects to the front page. Slashdot is stagnant. Utter fucking turd of editors and submitters. Fuck you.

Naive face value: president would repeal 1201

[Sloppy]

If you read what was written idealistically and at face value, the president is advocating the repeat of DMCA's circumvention prohibitions.

Not that I really think the president holds that position, but all that stuff about not inhibiting innovation, "prevent[ing] overly broad private rights of action that could encourage unjustified litigation," etc all points to repealing that law.

Ron Paul's largest supporters are military.

[Colin Smith]

Ron Paul's largest supporters are military.

Speaks volumes.
 

Re:Ron Paul's largest supporters are military.

[mhollis]

Dupes?

Seriously, I was at a commuter rail station back when we were placing lots of National Guardsmen and women in them in order to encourage Americans to be afraid all of the time of Terrorists—but go shopping. I got into a conversation with a very nice gentleman who was just back from Iraq. He told me that "we need to reform all of these entitlements." I asked him for a definition of entitlement and he thought about it for a minute and said, "well, they're bad."

"Really?" I asked, "Where did you get this nice uniform?"

"It was issued to me," he answered.

"That's because you earned it and you are entitled to it because you did."

"An entitlement is something you earn?"

"True. you have earned the right to wear that uniform, you are entitled to it and the US Military gives you that entitlement as well as the uniform as an entitlement."

"So what is all this about these other entitlements, these bad entitlements that we cannot afford?"

"They were earned, too. In fact, you are entitled to go into a Veteran's Administration hospital to get checked out any time you feel you need to. That's another entitlement, and it's one they have their eyes on."

"That's just wrong," he said.

"Additionally, you've been paying into the Social Security and Medicare system. If you die in service, Social Security gives your survivors a check. You don't want them to get that?"

"No, I don't think so."

"You get disabled and you're entitled to a Social Security check for disability. You think that is wrong?"

"No."

Frankly, I think that the United States Military has become one great big huge "political re-education camp." They get our boys overseas and they start lecturing to them about all of this nonsense and they haven't a clue as to what they're talking about and how, what they're espousing would really look once it hit them. I know it went on in Iraq, because I have spoken to dozens who have returned, spouting exactly the same talking points. I am also smart enough to know who proposed this war in Iraq. For much of the time after the invasion, our men and women were in camps with nothing to do. And I think the political operatives made sure they had a lot of "educational materials."

If Ron Paul were actually elected, here is what would really happen:

We would downsize our military at a level that we have not so done since WW I and that would throw many of these fine men and women out of work in an economy that is not great.

Oh, but Ron Paul's largest supporters are military.

until they realize what he says really means.

This is exactly what happened under Shrub. He told everyone we needed to starve government of the money we needed for social programs. And the end result of that is a country that is having trouble digging its way out of a recession because we didn't have the money for the social support necessary to build back an economy that the bankers ruined.

Oh and we "couldn't afford" to rebuild New Orleans.

But we could afford to pay Halliburton over $1 million weekly to "rebuild Iraq."