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MPAA-Dodd Investigation Petition Reaches Goal
An anonymous reader writes "The petition on 'We the People' website petitioning the administration to investigate Chris Dodd for corruption has reached the required 25,000 votes in two days: now the government has to officially respond to the petition. The petition ... stemmed from Chris Dodd's statement that tried to portray campaign donations as quid-pro-quos for SOPA/PIPA votes."
my money is on ignore
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
Cue up the bullshit, meaningless response! Boy it's great having a voice in government, even if it's constantly ignored!
Don't be silly.
There is no "HAS TO" when the government is involved.
And a one word response of "DENIED" is all you are likely to get, or the Washington equivalent, of a vague promise of having it looked into, followed by a chuckle-fest in the back room over brandy on the rocks.
The whole thing sort of reminds me of one of the typical flame fests here on Slashdot or Usenet. Lots of smelly wet wool. But nobody notices that you "won the internet".
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
We the People: This is bribery! We demand you investigate yourselves!
Gov'ment: We've investigated ourselves thoroughly, and we're guilty (sad-face)
The petition titled "Actually take these petitions seriously instead of just using them as an excuse to pretend you are listening" reached 25,000 by the required date and currently has 33,000 signatures. It has received no response despite being almost 3 months old.
(Link: https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/actually-take-these-petitions-seriously-instead-just-using-them-excuse-pretend-you-are-listening/grQ9mNkN)
"We the people" is a propaganda tool to be exploited when convenient, and nothing more.
I await the generic response pulled from the filing cabinet soon
"No comment."
...the White House quietly removes the We the People petition system.
My expectations are very, very low as to the outcome of this petition. Anyone who expects anything more than a cursory "We understand your concerns but feel statements made on a news channel do not merit an investigation" has their head in the sand.. ..but still, I can't help but tap at the sand regardless.
Now I think a petition should be made about the RIAA/MPAA suing dead grandmas and 10 year old children.
Could we, the people, submit encoded data as "questions" and then parse it to violate copyright? How about asking questions with links to illegal websites?
Keep on signing that puppy. I think they need to realize that there's a few more than "just" 25K people interested.
Here's another poll that folks might like to John Henry.
"For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong."
-H. L. Mencken
That most /.'s actually believed Obama would run an open and honest administration. Democrats are great on the talk, worse on the walk but liberals will never see it.
Change the wording to include "I will not vote for Obama until...." see how that changes their response.
Of course you have to be willing to follow through...
Umm, has anybody carrying on actually bothered to look at the legal standard for bribery? As loathsome as Dodd is his actions don't even begin to touch it. The petition is a silly slap. Why would they give a real response?
If you want to get Dodd, and you should, do something real.
Same problem with our UK e-petitions. I signed a few and just got a bunch of propaganda emailed to me.
Just gotta hope it backfires on them like the cahiers de doleances. Vive la revolution.
This is the first I'm reading the link fro the last Slashdot story ...
Seriously
I didn't think any of these guys went so far as to acknowledge that they've been bought and paid for. Usually they try to couch it in nicer terms, but this pretty much says if you're gonna take the bribe, you gotta do what they tell you.
Holy crap, does that sound illegal. Not that they'd over pass laws that actually limit the money from the lobbyists ... that's too big of a chunk of their income.
And people wonder why everyone thinks politicians are corrupt.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I wouldn't be surprised if the White House has Dodd himself write a response. When the "End the TSA" petition got a response, it was written by the head of the TSA. Why not?
Former US House candidate, TN-5
Their response will be similar to all the other responses to petitions they don't like-- completely dodge any of the points and cut/paste a wikipedia like entry. See their response to eliminating the TSA for violating people's civil rights and being useless-- nothing more than Pistole cut/pasting the TSA's official mission statement.
This one will probably be more of a campaign like statement that they care about the people and protect their rights completely dodging the statements in the petition.
I looked at his comments and I don't feel the outrage we're getting bombarded with on Slashdot. Especially over a 25K online petition. Believe me, I have a lot of problems with Dodd's cozy relationship with the financial industry (probably what's driving him out of the Senate), but this is hardly one of them.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Why would anyone expect fromer Senator Dodd to be investigated for this? This is the man who, along with a few others, stood in the way of anyone doing anything about the problems with the financial systems in this country until it all blew up. Then he was asked to write the law that would "fix" the problem that led to the meltdown.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
1) They were never allowed to physically meet lawmakers, ever.
2) All requests were limited to about 1000 words per week, in email.
3) All such requests were publically viewable via the internet as unformatted text files.
4) All lawmakers submitted their finances to lifelong review after serving with an eye to spotting cash sources from foreign bank accounts. Better still, make having foreign accounts or receiving money from foreign accounts a felony for ex-lawmakers.
5) No ex-lawmaker was ever allowed to act as a lobbyist, ever.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
It may just be a cynic's response, but either:
1) It is ignored.
2) Nothing comes of the investigation.
3) Even if he is investigated and evidence is found, it doesn't change the fact that everyone does it. In fact, we're more likely to see the whole
"one and only one guy was doing this and the system is cleaned" effect, rather than pointing out that everyone does it and he's in fact woken up the populace.
Could this spark real change? Sure. Will it? No. Will someone take his place? Yes.
A petition with a million signatures on their own website is much easier to ignore than a single person with a sign at the corner of a road.
Those > 27k people who sign the petition is now on the White House hit list!
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
For I have spotted what appears to be a disk, a black flap, and a scorpion while scrutinizing this first post.
Criminal behavior is investigated if the police/attorney is notified of a criminal act. Extortion, Bribery and Libel are quite possibly felonies.
Taking the long way round via a petition sounds quite pointless. The judiciary system has to do this work, while a petition is aimed at the legislative system.
"Oh... the government will do nothing!"
"The crooks won't investigate their handlers!"
"The petition will be ignored!"
Are you the **AA 'turfing or just fashionably rebellious with your doubt of the value of the US Judicial system? If you've given up already, why are you bothering to comment?
Remember when Nixon was investigated? What about when Clinton got some booty on the side? Big investigations DO happen and they have to start somewhere. If you don't like the idea of an investigation, then say so. I'd genuinely like to hear those comments. But if all you got are "Whaaa! They've done nothing in the past, they'll do nothing again!", then you're the worst kind. You remove value from the entire discussion and give nothing in return..
If you give in to your butt-hurt and so easily declare "They so rarely do what I want... why bother?", then WE can never get anything done. You are WORSE than those who do nothing because you KNOW something is bad and take the time to discourage others from acting on the injustice.
Did you notice how they want your real-life information for these petitions?
This isn't about giving people a voice in government. It's about collecting people's information so they can be solicited for campaign contributions.
When you go into a store and they ask you for your info and one of the items is "email address", do you give the real email address? Of course not, because you know you're going to get all kinds of spam from those people.
:(){
this actually meant something.
As lobbying of Congress is currently legal and would require legislation passed by Congress to make it otherwise there is very little that can be done about this kind of Bribery for Votes. Yes, it is Congressional Prostitution (maybe our Congresspersons should just put their votes up for bidding on eBay), however it is perfectly legal...with certain restrictions. At the very best one can expect is a formal Censure (a harshly worded letter accompanied by a Majority Vote of approval of the Censure letter). Since 1966 Censure has occurred only 9 times in the Senate and 6 times in the House. What is more than likely is that you will hear all kinds of rhetoric about Lobby Reform as you do in every election year, but it's double-speak and never results in any kind of action or actual reform.
So if you wave at it, do you get arrested for being a terrorist?
I miss the Clinton years. The web was new, the economy was doing well by the end, and I wasn't terrified of my own government!
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
OH MY GOD! AN OFFICIAL RESPONSE? THEY WILL BE SHAKING IN THEIR SHOES BROTHERS!
THE REVOLUTION HAS BEGUN!
In the words of William Wallace:
FREEEEEEDOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!!
(appropriately the fake one in a historically inaccurate movie...)
You know the scene, just before he had his bowels torn out and put on display?
Yeah. That's the one. Fitting metaphor
...but unfortunately the MPAA issued a DMCA takedown notice claiming that the response was a copy of one of the generic cliche government responses used in many prime time television shows.
I'm sure it will be just like his eloquent "We don't give a shit what you think about pot because we're gonna keep throwing kids in jail for our big pharma friends, here have a Goatse" response. If anybody believes these things are gonna do shit I have some nice swampland in AR you might be interested in, almost gator free!
lets be honest folks, for the past 15 years or so they haven't even bothered to hide the bribes anymore, i'm tempted to say it started with Dubya but Clinton was right there in it too, it just got REALLY blatant with Dubya and his "Have and have mores' attempts at humor. Now that they have Citizens United they are simply more of a citizen than you, because while you may have the teeming masses they have the bulging briefcase and bulging briefcase beats teeming masses every single time. Ya know, I actually kinda like Dodd now, at least he is an honest whore, unlike Obama who can give a 30 minute speech responding to these and not say a god damned thing or even acknowledge their existence.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
The history of the big media content cartel insinuating itself into the workings of the U.S. government over the past dozen or two years is depressing and leaves a bad taste in my mouth. This is the undermining of American democracy. From the orchestration of the extension of copyright protection to life plus 75 years, to the DMCA and its disregard for due process and freedom. To the secretive smoke-filed backroom history of ACTA, culminating in the arrogance of how SOPA and PIPA were show trialed through the judiciary committees of both houses of Congress. Now it appears that the money men of the MPAA, RIAA and others have been orchestrating this with concealed bribery and mock support of liberal principal. And that the leaders I secretly hoped were men and women of principal are, instead, pathetic opportunists, who have sold the American birthright out for a mess of pottage.
This history has taken a wrecking ball to the idea that my country, the once proud United States, is a democracy, is governed by the love of liberty or has any legitimacy left whatsoever. Rather it has become a disgusting perversion of what it once was. I cry for my country, my children and grandchildren.
because the Libertarians are incorruptible, right?
Nope. They are as corruptible as anyone.
But first, they will shrink government, so the corruption matters less and is on a smaller scale.
The greater the power the greater the temptation to corrupt or abuse it. That is why the ONLY successful way to fight corruption is to reduce the scale of temptation. When more power is in states hands it is easier to monitor for corruption, after all how easily can the voters in a state really keep an eye on what someone is doing all the way over in DC?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Libertarian is no better, it just gives power to a different small group of people.
Libertarianism is not about shifting which group gets power, as in the left/right swing.
It is about fundamental reduction of the size of government, so the group is smaller to begin with. And with the focus on moving power back to states, you are not just changing the group that gets the power but distributing said power over many smaller groups - smaller local groups are easier to monitor and less prone to corruption, in part because they simply do not wield as much power.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Speaking of you can post your own petition. Here goes! https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/congressional-reform-act-2011-congress-must-equally-abide-all-laws-they-impose-american-people/s3DTkzrl sopa had senators back of because enough people took notice. If more then just 25K sign it shows we are looking and paying attention.
love the taste, hate the texture
We could use some bigger numbers if you SlashDotterers can learn how to register, or log-in, to WhiteHouse Dot Gov. You also have to click some things and provide a zip code I think. If I caught you in the middle of a revolution planning session I apologize. I understand that you are probably to busy.
Link Link Link
https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/investigate-chris-dodd-and-mpaa-bribery-after-he-publicly-admited-bribing-politicans-pass/DffX0YQv
Hey; we might get a newspaper story or two out of this. It is somewhat embarrassing.
All Obama is going to do is say Chris Dodd does not work here anymore. He can say what he wants. Free Speech etc... Now I wonder if Laundered MPAA/RIAA Monies have made it into the Obama Election Funds...
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Corruption comes from two sources; power and being unaccountable.
If you have to few people in government you have corrupt folks because they are able to act with impunity and nobody can do anything about even when everyone does they guilty as sin itself.
You also get corruption when government gets to big; nobody is ever accountable, no not even in our world where everything is recorded and logged. Once you get a government as big as ours its almost always the case that crimes even consistent and repeated ones go unnoticed lost in the noise, crimes can't be addressed because there is always a bigger fish to investigate, and nothing can be made to stick because there is so many others for the perp to point the finger at and say oh "well...I...but for...."
The solution is not no government (Somalia is staw man) nor is the solution more government, solution is SMALL TIERED government. You want to have a handful of people closely accountable to electorate so we all no their names, each fairly direct, clear, and knowable responsibilities.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Okay, then write a petition investigating him of criminal behavior, and if it's found, to force him to give back his salary for those years worked while corrupt.
Oh, and so it's got a chance in hell of passing Congress, make sure that money gets divided up and put into the personal funds of current members of Congress.
Imagine the carnage that would eventually ensue!
That site doesn't work for me in Chrome. Do you have to use a certain browser, or am I locked out because I'm a dissident?
https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petition-tool/petition/actually-take-these-petitions-seriously-instead-just-using-them-excuse-pretend-you-are-listening/grQ9mNkN
Nice try. At most the White House (Executive branch) can say "We think so too." The people who write laws, and exclude Congress, are in Congress (the Legislative Branch).
At most he could try to veto it, but guess who overrides a veto? Congress.
Of course it is. Due to Citizens United, and money being free speech, all Dodd was doing was exercising his right to speak his mind. He did not offer money specifically to pass PIPA/SOPA, he said he would not make a campaign contribution if the White House opposed it.
Which, in all honesty, is the same kind of thing I say all the time. I'm not voting for someone if they do this, I'm not supporting them if that... it will likely come down to a big nothing.
So indeed, fear not. All is well, citizen.
Erh... smaller government only means you have to grease fewer palms.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You... RAWOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!
I give them >>A real email address. Mail sent to it will even get to me. But when they start sending political spam I can turn it off.
You are as Anonymous as anyone else. If you think Anonymous should do something, then do it.
The FBI is now so tone deaf, blind, and willfully ignorant of the crimes in its own countries. It went 2 hemispheres away to find racketeering, criminal conspiracy, etc. in New Zealand. While a publicly a former official solicits quid pro quo from sitting elected officials. if the FBI did a tap dance at least you would know it IS a show. Give me a break.....how much longer are we going to have any more respect for the legal system? From the bottom to the top, we should start brand new. If Dotcom has to go to jail, and now being held without bail.....then Chris Dodd should too. So should the owners of Youtube, and the CEO of Sony for hacking my PS3.....
The solution is not no government (Somalia is staw man) nor is the solution more government, solution is SMALL TIERED government. You want to have a handful of people closely accountable to electorate so we all no their names, each fairly direct, clear, and knowable responsibilities.
So exactly the libertarian stance.
Now tell us who made you believe the libertarians are not for exactly this.. was it the Republicans you love, or the Democrats you love? Either way, we know it was someone you love because you accepted a lie without question.
"His name was James Damore."
So that instead of bribing politicians to get our way, we bribe the corporations directly...
Not that George bush wasn't dirty, but both him and Clinton don't seem like the type to take bribes. Attention whores. Yes. But bribes? But what I know? Now Congress OTOH, you can bet on that everyone of them bastards as being guilty. In fact, I wager that it's virtually impossible to climb the political ladder without taking some bribes and partaking in blackmail. Not that it makes it right. Perhaps I'm too naive to think otherwise about how politics should work in general.
Politics. It's a dirty place to be in.
Life is not for the lazy.
Why are we signing petitions? It's primary election season. Let's make an example of one of the congressmen-for-hire.
the Tea Party came to power when Scott Brown defeated an incumbent in a primary contest. Let's get an incumbent SOPA supporter out of office because he supported SOPA.
Primary congressional elections are where the real electoral power is... and we have a tendency to ignore them. I believe that nothing less than a primary loss from a SOPA or PIPA supporter would get their attention.
The problem is they get $50,000 for their campaign fund for supporting it. The solution, obviously, is to make it cost them more than $50,000 worth of publicity for supporting it.
Lamar Smith, who introduced SOPA, is currently running uncontested for the Republican Primary in his district.
The requested URL
It works fine in Chrome. Check your plugins.
When all it takes for a law to pass is to bribe some Washington Insider, who's constituents were never informed of the action. And those that will be affected, are never informed. That to me, is bribery.
Coming from Finland, I could say that the tiered government is a pretty good idea. Ours is a BIG one though. And by no means libertarian. We have been ranked pretty high on the list of least corrupt nations. Unfortunately, things are changing. I used to sit on the library board. As there are only few people involved and small sums of money, it is difficult to get away with corruption and waste. And it is a cheap system as these people are volunteers. The problem we have (or had) was that for a small country we had too many tiers. For five million people we had (I am using rough equivalents here) towns, districts, counties plus others for medical care or military... And these latter ones are not cheap. Luckily, we are getting rid of some of these. The thing that works with libertarians (in my opinion) is that there is less someone else's money to play around with. There are some downsides though.
Uncontested fuckwit introduces SOPA
Why the fuck isnt there a democrat candidate there?
This would be the district to beat him in, we need to organise someone to beat him NOW
The only thing to do is to hit where it hurts, get them outvoted during the elections, 162million people viewed the wikipedia SOPA blackout page, we can do it
But first, they will shrink government, so the corruption matters less and is on a smaller scale.
You don't need less government for that, you need more sovereignty (i.e. less laws dicated from Washington, more laws left to the state/community).
You realize that anyone that signed that petition is now on the Pirate Watch List.
In other news 25,000+ people will be spending the rest of their lives in a ZOG stockade under NDAA.
I bet the parent post is going to be one of the most-often-modded posts in /. history.
My sister opened a computer store in Hawaii. She sells C shells by the seashore.
This administration has shown time and time again that it is interested in "looking forward and not backward", when asked to investigate officials that may have been guilty of war crimes, when asked to investigate the titans of Wall Street who may have been guilty of fraud... The only way Chris Dodd will face significant consequences is if he finds a way to commit his crimes in the FUTURE before they become acts committed the PAST. :)
Let me predict what this regime's "official" response to this petition will be: "OUR OFFICIAL RESPONSE IS NO COMMENT".... And then you wonder why we so dearly love the "Dear Leader".....
THANK YOU, Edward Snowden!! Americans owe you a debt of gratitude (whether they know it or not..)
But first, they will shrink government, so the corruption matters less and is on a smaller scale.
Yep, disband the EPA so Monsanto can make the air in Sauget, IL unbreathable again and have rivers catch fire again. Deregulate the power companies so California's brownouts and blackouts ten years ago are daily and nationwide. Deregulate the banks again so we have another economic catastrophe. Deregulate the monopoly utilities so they can gouge us for whatever CORRUPT price they wish to charge us.
What could possibly go wrong?
That is why the ONLY successful way to fight corruption is to reduce the scale of temptation.
Yep, if we legalize armed robbery the armed robbers won't have to pay off the corrupt cops.
You, sir, are a fool.
Free Martian Whores!
If you have to few people in government
Can I few people if I don't have to?
You also get corruption when government gets to big
I hope you're not a native speaker, but considering your views I sadly think you're just not a native reader.
solution is SMALL TIERED government.
We have a nation 4000 miles wide and 3000 miles tall. Neither pollution, commerce, water, oil pipelines, gas pipelines, radio waves, the list goes on, stay within state boundaries. With a huge country to govern, a small government simply will not work.
Imagine how expensive your natural gas would be if you were taxed for every state it passed through.
Free Martian Whores!
I imagine this is the reason our founders included "interstate commerce" within the powers delegated to the federal government through our great Constitution. Do you guys even attempt to understand that thing before you start your diatribes about the horrors of small government? The other funny attack often seen is when "state functions" like cops and firefighters are brought up to attack people clamoring for a smaller federal government -- I feel like a Civics class should be mandatory for all citizens.
The other funny attack often seen is when "state functions" like cops and firefighters are brought up to attack people clamoring for a smaller federal government -- I feel like a Civics class should be mandatory for all citizens.
I agree, but you have the other extreme (Paul, Gingrich, etc) that want to get rid of the FAA and the EPA and the highway administration and the FCC and the FAA. I'm damned glad Eisenhower started the interstate highway system. Like you, I'm bemused that a lot (most?) of the people who are are against "big government" have those views because of some crooked local cop or overreaching state or even county agency that screwed them over.
I also agree with you that some agencies shouldn't exist -- DEA, ATF, TSA... and the FBI should be much smaller. And I wonder why they had to amend the Constitution to outlaw alcohol, but didn't have to for other drugs?
Free Martian Whores!
I'll agree that's extreme, and also why I don't fully support such stances. But it also would never happen -- I support Ron Paul because his focus and his message and his integrity are solid. Congress would tame his more extreme wackier ideas. I also believe the "Extreme" element of libertarianism is the exception not the norm -- most people in that camp just want smaller government.
Well that should be obvious -- we're no longer a country governed by the Constitution -- they just do whatever the hell they want.