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GOP Congressman Defending Privacy Vote: 'Nobody's Got To Use The Internet' (washingtonpost.com)
Wisconsin congressman F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. defended his decision to help repeal broadband privacy rules by telling a constituent, "Nobody's got to use the Internet." An anonymous reader quotes the 73-year-old congressman:
"And the thing is that if you start regulating the Internet like a utility, if we did that right at the beginning, we would have no Internet... Internet companies have invested an awful lot of money in having almost universal service now. The fact is is that, you know, I don't think it's my job to tell you that you cannot get advertising for your information being sold. My job, I think, is to tell you that you have the opportunity to do it, and then you take it upon yourself to make that choice... That's what the law has been, and I think we ought to have more choices rather than fewer choices with the government controlling our everyday lives."
"The congressman then moved on to the next question," reports The Washington Post, but criticism of his remarks appeared on social media. One activist complained that the congressman's position was don't use the internet if you don't want your information sold to advertisers -- drawing a clarification from the congressman's office.
"Actually he said that nobody has to use the Internet. They have a choice. Big difference."
"The congressman then moved on to the next question," reports The Washington Post, but criticism of his remarks appeared on social media. One activist complained that the congressman's position was don't use the internet if you don't want your information sold to advertisers -- drawing a clarification from the congressman's office.
"Actually he said that nobody has to use the Internet. They have a choice. Big difference."
In the USA, if you wish to actually be a part of modern society, yes you really do have to use the Internet.
Just like not having a phone number became a liability many years ago, not being online cuts you off from modern life.
This guy is living in the past...
If you want to keep unprincipled actors in the datamining sphere from getting (too much) information about you, you *can* avoid patronizing internet services that are run by them. That means you don't get to enjoy 95% of the internet, because every-fucking-thing is run/owned/exploited/controlled by Google, Facebook, Akamai, Cloudflare...
I'm unusually careful with what I do on the internet compared to most people I know, and every year I feel more and more socially handicapped. As in:
"Oh, you don't do Facebook? I'll send you the invite by email then".
"What do you mean you didn't find it? It's the first line in Google search... What the fuck is Duckduckgo?".
"You should have used Waze instead of that offline satnav: it shows traffic jams and speed cameras live! What do you mean it's evil?"
Etc etc etc...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Let's see him win his next reelection without using the Internet. Is that possible? Of course not. As long as old white men like him keep getting elected into office, things will never get better.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
How can you not use the internet let's see to not use the internet would require:
1. Drawing money for a month before the experiment start as most banks use internet technology to contact their branches. (Yes might be secured but still TCP/IP)
2. You cannot buy from certain stores because they use internet technology to update store details and order new stock.
3. You cannot even send a letter or receive a letter because I can promise you the systems that sort your mail are connected to the internet in some way. (Uses network technology)
4. In some buildings you will not be able to use elevators so walk up the stairs as they monitor the lifts via internet connections.
5. You cannot watch TV because the TV stations use internet connections to build their news and even news papers become problematic.
6. You cannot use a phone because even landline phones these day at some stage pass through internet connected devices.
7. Oops cannot use electricity from electricity grid, even the solar panel controler is that you use at your home might be connected to the internet.
So yes it is absolutely possible to not use the internet. But you will have to live somewhere in a forest somewhere.
if you don't want your personal info as a public servant to be available to anyone 24/7 don't be a public servant.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
The ISP having your browsing data is the LEAST of your worries, since they have not sold anything before these rules, and the rules they struck down were not even in place.
The real people who sell your data to advertisers would be doing so without anything to do with your ISP - Google/Facebook/Amazon etc. If you want to do something without THEM knowing, well good luck I say - or do not do it on the internet (or with a credit card).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Nah, there's are legions of Republicans and a few Democrats that will still get voted in because their constituents are just as backward as they are. Texas is a prime example. Science? They've heard of it but figure is it a colossal dodge by liberals to prevent them from having dominion over the earth and giving it a good fucking.
Are you trying to give this moron a heart attack? He's gotten to 73 years old being an ignorant git by not paying attention to things that will disrupt his view of the world. His constituents think he's just potty.
Our society requires rapid, successful transportation and communication. We have almost completely transitioned to a Just In Time (JIT) economy. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Thanks to JIT optimization, there are no large stores of immediately useful resources and goods in the US. All elements of our society depend on tight, reliable links between supply and demand. The stores only have a few days supplies. The stores rely on timely orders and deliveries to maintain stock and reduce overhead. The suppliers of stores only have a few days of supplies. They rely on receiving accurate and timely orders to know where to deliver. Those suppliers then must place timely and accurate orders to keep the next link in the chain moving. This continues all the way to the harvesting and transportation of raw materials. Every step is optimized to reduce overhead and unnecessary stock. Any supplier that fails to optimize is replaced by a more efficient supplier that has optimized. Every step is dependent on quick, accurate communication and transport. When this breaks down, people die.
For example, most of the deaths during the Hurricane Katrina debacle were not caused by the initial flooding. They were caused by the breakdown in transportation and communication.
ALL aspects of the US transportation and communication grids are dependent on the continued functionality of the internet. The phone systems are now interlinked with the internet. The management of the highways and the supermarkets all depend on the internet. The internet supports all orders and deliveries in the US. Without the internet, there is no food in the stores or gas in the gas stations. If the internet goes, the electrical grid quickly follows.
If the internet suffers an extended outage, there would be massive numbers of deaths. During the first few days, there would be thousands of deaths. During the first few weeks there would be millions of deaths. During the first few months, there would be billions of deaths.
On the other hand, the internet is built and maintained by hordes of capable people. We can overcome almost any obstacle. Once the dying starts, we will come up with answers. They will not be pretty, but they should be functional. Hopefully, one of the first acts will be the elimination of anybody who claims that the internet is unnecessary.
For saying something so entirely ignorant, he should be disconnected from his ISP. I'm not talking about just his computer, I'm talking about his phone, his TV and every damn device that invariably is linked to his ISP. What he doesn't realize is that the internet has become much more than using a computer, it's everything that is a form of a electronic communication.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Let's see him coordinate his campaign without the Internet. Like it or not, over the last 25 years the Internet has basically transformed the industrialized world, and is already making an incredible amount of headway in the developing world. I'll wager in another 25 years, we'll view this kind of moronic statement with the same general derision as someone around 1910 mocking people who want electricity generally available.
In other words, this guy is a fucking moron, a simpering halfwit who probably does get elected because he's in a district that just knee jerk votes for the guy wearing the right team jersey.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
If they're going to sell our data then they have to wait until 2018 and ALL previous data must be deleted. Everyone starts from scratch with a clean slate. If not, then all federal employees and elected officials using government computers must give FREE public access to THEIR previous user history. This, of course, will need to be available in hard copy for those who choose not to use the internet. ;)
Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
Um, what?
When people go to vote, they look at the (D) or (R) next to the name and vote. Hence why parties exist in the first place, it all but eliminates third parties.
at 73 he probably equates the internet thing with the telegraph.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
So there will be a larger market for VPNs. Well, that is if people really do care about being targeted by ads as much as some claim they do.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Or spend a few extra dollars and set your router to encrypt and route all your traffic through a VPN. Many consumer-grade routers you buy today already have that option.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Not to mention they're terrified of such dangerous innovations as "the wheel" and "fire"
Anonymous Cowards generally receive no replies because you're a coward and I'm a bitch
What police state? This makes it more likely that people will route all their traffic through encrypted tunnels to VPNs. This makes surveillance more complicated. Any additional to cyclotomic complexity of the traffic increases the expense of surveillance. So this actually would force more people in the US to complicate the job of surveilling people in the US. That doesn't sound like a push towards a police state.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Sensenbrenner being a good Amish name.
"I love it how Republicans want smaller government just big enough to fit in our bedrooms." - West Wing
Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
why anyone still votes for the GOP? Religion? Are the Tax Cuts worth it? And no, the other side isn't as bad. This last disaster passed along party lines.
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Exactly. How many GOVERNMENT sites are the single point of access for those services?
Hell, my job itself REQUIRES internet connectivity.
If I can't support my place of business' IP phone and am unable to remote into the systems of our company or our clients I DO NOT HAVE A JOB and have to try to go work at McDonalds...
This guy is living in the fucking 60's. In a home for the developmentally disabled. On life support. In a vegetative state.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Internet companies have invested an awful lot of money in having almost universal service now.
Yes, those billions of taxpayer dollars given to them during the Clinton administration, and the billions more in tax breaks and what amounts to effective monopolies, is a lot of money being spent by the end users. It's so much money, ISPs have to be reminded they can't spend taxpayer money on booze and trips to Disney World.
As we saw recently, the taxpayers keep being told they have to hand over their money to these private companies for. . . well, no one's really sure since neither service or accessibility has been increased in many places.
and when i finally retire and my income gets cut by 75% i will drop the internet and my cellphone and rely on the us post office for all my communication (if i can afford a postage stamp) and we will see how well i can get along without those technologies
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
This is an uninformed comment. Congressmen in safe districts don't need the Internet to get reelected. People vote based on party.
He can go as long as he wants without using the Internet - all he has to do is ask his staff to do everything for him.
To say companies built the INTERNET is stupid. It goes back to military and academia and carried forth largely by disinterested idealists who made things like GNU, liberated BSD, cypherpunks, netscape, even people creating languages like perl and php. I know this guy is just ignorant, but it is infuriating mostly since youth aren't even aware of these things.
Yeah fuck white people! Lets put some burning crosses on their lawns.
Yeah fuck white people! Lets put some burning crosses on their lawns.
No no no. You got it wrong. It is the rich we are supposed to hate; and you burn a lower case t on their lawn as a sign that it is time to leave.
And if that fails, dress up as the thing rich folk are most scared of, ghosts.
This space unintentionally left blank.
Well then. When the next election comes vote for someone else.
On behalf of Republicans everywhere, I'd like to apologize for the fact that our party includes some idiots like this congressman. We're working on replacing these fools.
As someone else mentioned, this guy has been in elected office since the 1960s (longer even than Hill & Billy), and he doesn't seem to have a clue about what's going on in the real world in the 21st century.
It doesn't matter whether you have to use internet or not. It's like arguing against equipping cars with safety belts because you don't have to use cars.
And the thing is that if you start regulating the Internet like a utility, if we did that right at the beginning, we would have no Internet
This claim is patently false. The distinguished congressman should strive to get his facts from more sources than just the lobbyists that are paid to persuade him to a certain perspective.
I was involved with internet comunications early on, and by the early 80's the internet was successfully moving into widespread commercial use. The "internet" was a collection of cooperating private and public funded networks that provided a single function: moving packets from one IP address to another. In the 80's, and both before and after for a good while, this collection of networks that together provided the "internet" took no action outside what one would expect of a "utility" service. There was no need to consider regulation like a utility because these companies were self regulating.
No, the problem is now that these companies want to extract additional revenue from the data they carry by LOOKING AT IT and then either making weighted decisions based on that information, or outright SELLING IT. When this starts happening, reasonable people start to cry foul, and THEN you have the issue of regulation come up as one method to solve the problem.
I'm not sure how rational people can justify this mindset. We pay our ISP to move packets from our IP address to others, and vice versa. This is no different conceptually than placing calls on the telephone network, or sending letters via the postal service. Phone companies and the postal service cannot, without a warrant, allow access to the communications and letters they transport. It is also illegal for third parties to intercept and 'read' these communications. So why then do we think it is in the best interests of our population to NOT have similar protections when we pay our ISPs to move packets of our information around?
1. Drawing money for a month before the experiment start as most banks use internet technology to contact their branches. (Yes might be secured but still TCP/IP)
All Tcp/IP is NOT Internet (lease lines).
Realistically, most point-to-point connections are virtual these days, encapsulated over the public Internet via a VPN tunnel. Yes, you can get physical leased lines, but why would you bother?
2. You cannot buy from certain stores because they use internet technology to update store details and order new stock.
Sure, stores that are not ACTUAL stores are not accessible is i problem to no one.
Your local grocery store uses the Internet to coordinate how much of each kind of produce it receives. To truly avoid the Internet, you would literally have to be a farmer and grow all your own food.
3. You cannot even send a letter or receive a letter because I can promise you the systems that sort your mail are connected to the internet in some way. (Uses network technology)
All letters are physical. I believe you refer to email.
Nope. The systems that sort your mail also upload metadata about every letter to centralized systems for logistics purposes so that they know how many long-haul trucks need to roll from point A to point B (and for law enforcement reasons).
4. In some buildings you will not be able to use elevators so walk up the stairs as they monitor the lifts via internet connections.
Actual 100% bullshit.
Actual 100% reality. At a bare minimum, those security cameras in the elevator are likely to be Internet-connected (or at least Intranet with some sort of gateway to the Internet). And in some cases, so are the monitoring systems that watch for malfunctions, plus the HVAC systems that provide heat and cooling in modern buildings, etc. We truly live in a connected world.
6. You cannot use a phone because even landline phones these day at some stage pass through internet connected devices.
Once again, leased lines != Internet.
I think the original poster was talking about the very real risk of receiving a phone call from a VoIP user. (And worse, most of them are fraudulent scammers faking local phone numbers. But I digress.)
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
> Mercers' and Koch Brothers' money will ensure that he gets replaced by someone even more authoritarian.
So you think he'll be replaced by someone who WOULD support a law prohibiting trading services for privacy?
"Authoritarian" means *more* rules, not fewer. This Congressman argued for fewer rules. In this particular case, the argument he made was a stupid one, but anyway it's the opposite of authoritarian. An authoritarian leader is one who seeks to impose more rules and laws. This guy argues that the internet flourished due to relatively few laws, so we shouldn't make laws unless they absolutely necessary. Precisely the opposite of authoritarianism. (And he supported his anarchist / limited government position by making a stupid argument).
"And the thing is that if you start regulating the Internet like a utility, if we did that right at the beginning, we would have no Internet..."
In the beginning, the Internet was an educational system and commercial activity was HEAVILY proscribed. It worked fine. Admittedly, it wasn't the Internet we all know and love today. But IMHO his above statement is simply random ignorant speculation.
> "Limited government" is really just code for "a government that cannot protect its ordinary citizens".
THAT is an authoritarian viewpoint, the idea that "limited government" is bad, that government control should *not* be limited. It may be right, it may be wrong, but either way it's the rallying cry of authoritarian regimes.
> Would it make you happy if I replaced
It would make me happy if our discussion led each of us to better understand our own beliefs and better understand the other person's viewpoint. Since you seem to say limited government is a very bad idea, would that mean you strongly support giving politicians *un*limited power, a totalitarian, autocratic, or authoritarian regime?
Which of those three styles of non-limited government would you say you support most, a totalitarian, autocratic, or authoritarian? Perhaps dictatorial?
He is right in that you don't actually "need" the Internet unless you've assimilated into modern culture enough to depend on it for communication or business. Most modern needs have been created because we really aren't struggling as a species to survive like we used to and why not create and capitalize on something the next generation isn't even going to know the difference on? Current though, these "needs" are backed by peer pressured under the ever evolving guise of Social Darwinism. People have created monsters they can't destroy or leave if they wanted to. Facebook is a good example. But, he is also wrong because the United Nations called the Internet a "basic human right" not that long ago. But, the UN is a bunch of Jesus hating, commy coddling Liberals out to destroy America when you're a 73 year old republican.
This isn't 1999 (pity, if it was I could look forward the the Dreamcast launch). It's 2017. Everyone understand what websites are, that your ISP knows which ones you've been to and that the information is very, very valuable.
Those politicians knew exactly what they were voting for or against. These people aren't morons and you're doing yourself and everyone a disservice by suggesting that they are.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
" I think we ought to have more choices rather than fewer choices with the government controlling our everyday lives"
Naturally if it's corporations attempting to control or interfere with our everyday lives, they are totally ok with that.
hypocritical twats.
Absolute statements are never true
I just read an article about "telehealth" by a local health care provider. I'd link the article, but they just send me this newsletter via snail mail and it does not appear to be online.
4 years ago they started doing this when a flood cut their patients off from services and they've been expanding it ever since. It mentions many benefits such as saving time transporting patients who may be having a stroke.
They cite a Harris Poll which (shockingly to me) showed that 74% of millennials would prefer seeing a doctor virtually and 71% of them want to use apps to share their health data.
The State of the Connected Patient - 2015 (Press Release)
Download here
(I guess you can download it, but they want your email, phone and company name first. I didn't.)
In other news, Sensenbrenner vehemently opposed, and [is] still committed to repealing the ACA
Are you an idiot? Open either site up without an ad blocker.
Hahahhaha. You think selling data is the same thing to providing targeted analytics and selling a service that provides a spot on a page based on those analytics, and you have the audacity to call the GP an idiot?
Thanks for the Sunday morning laugh. I'm sure you may have had something relevant in the rest of your post but every time I go to read it I just can't get past that first idiotic sentence.
Probably doesn't matter if they "don't have to vote for him" because his district is probably gerrymandered like so many of them are. Voters can't pick their so-called Representatives when the district boundaries have already picked the "right" voters.
Only solution I've been able to come up with would be "guest voting" for your representative. If you feel like your vote is pointless in your own district (as for example after it's been gerrymandered 150 miles like mine), then you can pick one of the neighboring districts and vote for a representative in that district. The more they gerrymander the districts, the more they are liable to get screwed up by guest voters. Another interesting wrinkle is that third-party voters could concentrate on one district and get some Congressional so-called representation. Of course, it would never happen. Pretty certain it would require a Constitutional amendment, and even if they got the amendment, the bastards would just come up with some new cheating game.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
I hope his everything is sold.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
In the USA, if you wish to actually be a part of modern society, yes you really do have to use the Internet.
You don't have to be part of modern society! Where did you get this entitled opinion? You always have The Unabomber Option, the conservatives' best friend. James Sensenbrenner is just pointing it out.
See, no matter how villainous conservatives allow corporations to be, you can always opt out of being their victims, either by taking your business to a different company, or where that's not possible (as is usually the case with ISPs), fucking off to a shack in the woods and not participating in society, like the Unabomber did. See, it's all optional and therefore all acceptable!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
What this ammounts to is the same issue several politicians have: there are too many people in representative positions that are completely disconnected with reality and will rule and give justifications for their actions that are incompatible with the reality of the nation they are supposed to represent.
If all we have are old rich white priviledged people in power, the interests that will be addressed are those of old rich white priviledged people. Of course for him Internet is something that can be optional because he doesn't care about getting a job, getting education for the modern era, dealing with everyday problems the plebs needs to, nor care for adapting himself to a modern age he has no need to care for. He can spend whatever is left of his decrepit life with family and friends he already has, spending all the money he has exploited from others and whatnot.
Give me a job like his, a salary like his, a routine like his and a life expectancy like his and I also wouldn't care about having an Internet connection or not. It's just too sad that we have congressmen who cannot see beyond their own needs and their own personal perspectives. It's alarming how many politicians cannot get out of their own bubble to reflect on what is most important for his constituents. Corruption and lobbying aside, we're looking at bigger cultural problems here where we cannot elect people who are able to represent adequately.
Cases like his are why culture, law and policies get pushed back to half a century ago and never progress. The rule of a priviledged minority disconnected with reality. The problem this time is that we're on the frontier of a paradigm shift, and if we can't get law and policies to follow the significant changes that are happening around us, we'll get trampled by it. This is akim to the nuclear age. We have an extremely powerful tool in our hands that is about to be misused
and subverted by the wishes of a powerful minority because people in power have no idea of the true consequences of mishandling it.
You don't know if you're supporting radically more government control of your life, or radically less - and you call *me* an idiot.
You hate those Republicans, just like you've been told to, and dutifully call anyone who asks you what you think, or asks you TO think, a "useful idiot", then scurry away before they say something else that might cause you to accidentally think.
I'll ask you again, do you want radically more government control, do you want politicians to have *un*limited power? Clearly you bought it when someone told you the Libertarian distrust of politicians seeking more power is stupid; is that because you trust politicians, and want to give them more power?
I undertand it might be disconcerting for me to ask you what you think. It might be scary to stop and think for three seconds in order to answer that question. It really might be interesting to be able to answer that question, though - are you trying for radically more government control, or radically less? Or is it just about right how it is?
> There is plenty wrong with the Democrat party that I'd love to see fixed, but right now voting for a Republican candidate is a non-starter.
For me, I can't vote for a party anymore. I have to take the extra time to research the candidates - and not just glance at headlines. Both parties have some ridiculously bad candidates and a few good ones.
> If the GOP would ditch the anti-science and pro-Christianity views, it could turn into a party that I might actually support.
Right now I think there are three factions, or branches, in the Republican party. The Moral Majority of the Reagan years is officially gone, bankrupt and no more. The party was going much more Libertarian; now Trump supporters voted "Republican" this last time - though Trump has little in common with traditional Republicans. Grabbing them by the pussy isn't a Christian ideal. "It is easier for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven", Christians are reminded, and a billionaire won the Republican nomination, so there's a large, decidedly non-Christian element who voted Republican in this election.
though Trump has little in common with traditional Republicans. Grabbing them by the pussy isn't a Christian ideal.
If you think that the average republican or republican voter gives one tenth of one fuck for christian ideals, then you are a grade-A dumbfuck who cannot possibly be educated because you willfully ignore all evidence. BOMBS NOT BREAD is the republican motto. WHO WOULD JESUS BOMB? Don't take in those refugees, but BOMB THEIR COUNTRY... creating more refugees. There is nothing christian about republicans or their supporters. NOTHING.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Let's see him coordinate his campaign without the Internet.
You don't need the internet to do gerrymandering. It's based on census information and other studies. What, you think that guy had to campaign politically to win? Tee hee
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
They backstab every part of their base - workers, unions, minorities - except for the donor class. At least Republicans will stab you in front. It's not that Republicans have increased in popularity - its that Obama and the Clintons have driven the party so far into the ground that they've lost at every level around the country. They are completely and utterly incapable of saying what they stand for besides "we're not Republicans."
You're right. The Democrats are worse. NAFTA. TPP. Gramm-Leach-Bliley. 1996 Telecom Act which means 6 companies control almost all print and broadcast media. Putting SS and Medicare cuts into federal budget proposals. Printing trillions to bail out fraudulent banks while letting those banks illegally foreclose on millions of homes. Starting a war and explicitly not asking Congress for permission first (Libya). Starting regime change to "protect Arab Spring protestors" in Libya and Syria while at the same time selling weapons to Bahrain, who were violently putting down their Arab Spring protests. Repealing the cornerstone of all civil rights, habeas corpus, with an NDAA that allows the military to detain you without warrant or trial, on American soil.
Trump is an ugly face on an ugly system, but he's going to have to work long and hard just to catch up to the Clinton and Obama freakshows, who were pretty faces on an ugly system. But Stepford Democrats DGAF because they are willfully blind partisan tribalists.
they literally see everything I do, as far as URLs go. I suppose there's TOR and the like, but then they know I'm using TOR. They're the gatekeepers. Like the phone company or library. Which is why we didn't let them sell that info.
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No way! Strawmen in flyover country are their outgroup and an acceptable outlet for their seething hatred and intolerance.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
That's entirely wrong. It increases the cyclotomic complexity of the analysis required to understand the data observed. And analysis costs grow faster than the complexity of the data analyzed.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Thanks for answering my question, to the extent that you did so. I still don't quite understand some of your statements which seem, to me, to be contradictory, but that's fine.
> how about you answer my question.
Are you referring to this question?:
> > If you are against "rules"...
I am in fact not against rules, including laws. In l particular, I study what I think are the most important laws - what you might call "meta laws", or some use the term "organic law" - laws which organizing a system for making laws. These are laws, or rules, about who can make laws about what, and how laws are made. The US Constitution, as amended, is an important example. Trump can't just declare new laws, there is a process, a process by which laws are made. There are well-defined limits on Trump's power and I think that's supremely important. Before Trump ran for president, I warned here on Slashdot that it was foolish to assent to Obama stretching the limits of his power, because that set precedent that would apply to President Palin or whoever came next. Now that Trump is president, I think most people agree that it's important to stand firm on the limits of presidential power.
A rule made by the FDA or the FCC is important, but far more important, to me, are the laws about what the FDA can do and how they can do it. Does the FDA have a legitimate power to make it illegal for you to eat something from your garden? If so, where does that legitimacy come from? The FDA says their power is delegated to them from Congress. Congress claims they have powers because the powers were delegated to Congress by the states, through the Constitution. Do the states have a legitimate right to tell you what you may eat from your garden? Did the states actually delegate that power to Congress? The argument, upheld in the Wheat Cases, is that the feds were granted that power by the INTERSTATE COMMERCE clause. Note there's nothing interstate going on, and there is no commerce, when you grow something in your garden. Yet SCOTUS decided that the Washington bureaucrats can forbid you from growing your own garden, for your own consumption, because that's "regulating interstate commerce". Bullshit, I say.
I believe that Colorado, through a vote of its citizens, can legalize marijuana. Growing your own weed is not "interstate commerce", so no, the states did not delegate to Washington the power to decide what you grow in your garden.
Even more interesting, perhaps, are the meta-meta-laws, the laws about how Constitutional law is made. You mentioned that laws need to be changed from time to time. Minor laws can be changed with minor consequences. Important laws will have important consequences - both desired consequences and unintended consequences. Therefore the process for changing the most important law, the process for amending the Constitution, is supremely important. Changes to the Constitution (amendments) are a big deal, so they should be done carefully, and with full participation of the citizens who will hopefully be as informed as possible about these important issues.
The intersection of money and politics is a problem. Probably an unsolvable problem for reasons that are beyond the scope of this post.
Charles Koch compared the contest between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton to being asked to choose cancer or a heart attack. He then compared Trump to Hitler https://www.theguardian.com/us...
Yet Trump is president, having run as a Republican. Clearly the Koch brothers don't in fact pick the president, nor the republican nominee. In fact, most powerful republicans opposed Trump's nomination; the de-facto leader of the party and 3rd in the line of succession, House Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, refused to endorse or defend Trump. All the powerful people (and arguably all the well-informed people) opposed Trump, yet he's president simply because ordinary voters liked what he had to say, more than they liked Clinton or Cruz, anyway.
A few years ago we ran a college student for city council, because we weren't happy with what some of the old fogeys on the council were doing. Our favorite word, "authoritarian" might apply to the established council. :)
The college student won, because we voted for him, and he got under the established council-members' skin because he wouldn't play the game. Much like Bernie Sanders or Rand Paul, this college student (Jess Fields) refused to go along with the rest of the council when they weren't doing the right thing. Jess is now running for the state legislature, and we fully expect he'll win.
If Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul can get elected to Congress, as much as they grate on the establishment, there's no reason we can't elect Jess Fields to Congress in a few years. He's a lot brighter, and representative of the people, than the idiot Congressman this article is about.
> What you just did is to confirm that you are out of step with the party that you apparently support.
As I mentioned elsewhere in this thread, these days I can't vote for a party, I have to spend the time to select a candidate, on their merits. As an example, for me, both Hillary and Trump seemed to be rather bad options, so I wouldn't vote for either based on party. I voted against Trump twice and against Hillary once.
In the *primaries* I must choose whether to vote in the Republican primary, the Democrat, or the Libertarian. For reasons outside the scope of this post, I find the general platform and approach of the Democrat leadership to be repugnant, so there are few Democrats I can support. The libertarian primary isn't strategically as important (though a libertarian vote in the general can make sense), so in the primary I end up voting with the intent of trying to get the Republicans to nominate the best (least objectionable?) candidate.
Once upon a time, before I got sick of it all, I used to call in to Conservative talk shows reminding their guests amd listeners that if conservatives support the Constitution, that means they must support the first amendment, not just the second amendment. The fourth amendment too. This because the liberals don't even pretend to value the Constitution, their shtick is ignoring ("reinterpreting") the Constitution based on how they feel from week to week. I can't make a Constitutional argument to an audience who believes the Constitution has no meaning beyond whatever their emotional gut feeling is at the moment. Again, I'm not saying conservatives follow the Constitution - I'm saying the CLAIM to. When they fail to do so, I can point out the inconsistency between their words and their actions.
Case closed, even you admit it.
You seem to be having trouble with the differences between selling data about you, and using data about you. Or maybe with reading.
"Easily".
Yep. Just use a browser add-on, such as this one. Most technical people know about them.
It's called a VPN retard
Settle down, petal. Running your PC's traffic through a VPN isn't hard, but it's still more work, expense, and expertise (and slower) than a browser add-on. And it's somewhat less easy if you want to run your entire network's traffic through one, including appliances like a Roku box etc.
And a VPN on your phone won't prevent carrier-installed rootkits from reporting anything they like. Remember Carrier IQ, which was found to be used by AT&T and many others (yes, even Apple), and was caught capturing keystrokes and passwords, copying and sending home texts etc? AT&T bought that not long ago, so it's clearly still in use - and that's only one we know about. Plus of course your carrier logs every call you make and every cell tower your phone touches, so good luck avoiding any of that.
And yes, all that personal data is used by AT&T to sell targeted ads on their AdWorks network, Sprint's Pinsight platform hosts other ad networks too, Verizon's is even bigger now they're buying Yahoo (plus they share your data with AOL), and Apple is no exception.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
But everyone in supporting the Congressman will need to give up all their existing communication system. That includes the phone lines. The internet is at the rawest form, a communication system. Heck, we used to use phone lines to go on the internet. If he can't do it, then it is no deal.
All utilities where luxury once. Now they are so pervasive that we can not live normal lives without them. The internet is the same way and should go the same route.
Oh, really
But back to my central point, which you diverted me from. What I think you understand by "limited government" is not the objective of the wealthy backers of the Republicans: instead, their objective is a government that is hobbled and unable to perform its primary mission. Without sufficient funds, the government cannot collect taxes allowing people (primarily the wealthy) to cheat on their taxes. Without sufficient funds, the government cannot enforce laws designed to protect the environment, to protect employees, to protect the weaker members of society, etc..
Their idea of limited government is one that is incapable of anything except waging war and putting more money into the bank accounts of the wealthy.
If you ran a business where you knew with absolute certainty that, if you hired more people, you would make an additional profit of 6 times the cost of hiring those people, would you hire them? If so, why does the IRS not have sufficient inspectors?
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Okay so for you it's pretty much about you want to send more of our money to Washington, it sounds like. Okay. Just curious, looking at this:
http://www.usgovernmentspendin...
At what point is it enough? Right now the government takes 37% of your pay, and clearly that's not enough for you. How much is enough? 50%? 80%?
FYI if you wren't aware Washington gets 37% and you get 63%, it looks something like this:
You earn $100.
Washington takes $7.65 and calls it FICA. (Actually they take 15.3%, but let's pretend it's only 7.65%)
You have $92.35 left.
Washington takes $20-$25 and calls it income taxes. You have about $70 left.
You use the $70 to put gas in your cars. Washington takes $5.36, calling it gas tax. You earned $100 and get $65 worth of gas - Washington took the other $35.
> Fund the IRS properly and the government could reduce taxes and keep the same level of revenue. Why isn't this happening?
The IRS has said that what they need is $58 million to replace the software system that they use for fraud detection. I guess they know what they need.
So Congress and the Clinton administration gave them the $58 million. Then they told the Obama administration they needed another $65 million - they had a bit of trouble managing the project. Then they needed another $50 million. That's around the time the department's own inspector general pointed out that the approach used by the new system doesn't actually work. The IRS currently estimates they'll finish the new software in 2022 - twenty-eight years after they started the project. Not that any of their projections so far have been correct, but if they manage to pull it off this time they will have spent hundreds of millions of dollars and 28 years to build a system that doesn't work, based on Windows 3.1 era software design.
We should definitely give them another $300 million to do more of that kind of thing.
I have said it before, and I'll say it again:
Way too many politicians are NOT truly qualified for the position.
Government officials should NOT allow their own opinions to affect legislation that serves the masses.
e.g. In this case, it is NOT exactly true that you "do not have to use the internet".
If we truly want that option, then laws need to be in place to make those internet-only accessible things available outside of the internet.
AND, this means MORE government regulation, not less!
Sensenbrenner is an obviously obsolete politician.. He should man-up and step down.
And I digress from here!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.