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Seattle Finds Facebook in Violation of City Campaign Finance Law (reuters.com)
Seattle's election authority said on Monday that Facebook is in violation of a city law that requires disclosure of who buys election ads, the first attempt of its kind to regulate U.S. political ads on the internet. From a report: Facebook must disclose details about spending in last year's Seattle city elections or face penalties, Wayne Barnett, executive director of the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission, said in a statement. The penalties could be up to $5,000 per advertising buy, Barnett said, adding that he would discuss next steps this week with Seattle's city attorney.
The law went unenforced against tech companies until a local newspaper, The Stranger, published a story in December in the wake of the Russia allegations asking why.
It's ironic because, in both of Obama's campaigns he claimed to get the majority of his fundraising from individual credit card donations and many people pointed out that nobody could track the source of the money wondering if that was in violation of campaign finance laws.
Nobody bothered investigating that.
OTOH, California and Washington refused to provide information to Trump's election investigation too because they felt they had a right to ignore laws they detest. Perhaps Facebook and Google should do the same and cite to the courts this same rationale.
Funny thing there was an episode of Sliders codemning Republicans for taxing sodas etc. Funny it turned out to be Democrats to do it instead.
The idea with safe injection sites -- aside from just being a decent human and recognizing that other people need help -- is that needles are easier and cheaper to deal with than bodies (or worse, long-term health problems like AIDS and other needle-transmitted diseases. Even if you decide the person in question isn't worth treating, they've got the possibility to spread those diseases around and multiply the costs.)
But of course, helping people in need is UnAmerican.. at least in the opinion of many on the right (and even some on the left.) They'll happily eat whatever long-term costs if they get to punish people _right now_ who fell on hard times, made one bad choice they can't escape from, or were just plain unlucky in life.
For disclosing the financing behind a political ad? If I buy TV time or space on a billboard for a political ad, it's up to me to place some identifying information within the ad. The media owners may have no idea who is behind the advertisement. Because more often than not, the space in the media is purchased through an ad agency or other intermediary.
Now, if Seattle determines that some ad isn't within compliance of an election law, they can serve Facebook with a warrant to find out who pays for that account. But Facebook has no way of determining in advance to what use I am putting my pages. I might be using it to promote my favorite pizza place or microbrewery. It's not up to Facebook to track that in advance. They may not even have the expertise to evaluate ads for political content.
Have gnu, will travel.
You know, it's funny: before Trump was elected, it was all about piling power upon power into the federal government. We can't have everyone consulting state and local governments every time they want to do something, too burdensome. Inefficient. Moreover the people at the federal level are smarter and better at their jobs. They have advanced degrees from better schools. Who has Seattle got? People with degrees from State U?
Then overnight, it went to inefficient burdensome regulations written by the poorly educated for everyone. Suddenly it was good? You realize one of Trump's "things" is that we don't need a federal government to do everything and state & local governments can do for themselves? You're just falling for his con man act. I thought you were smarter than that. Resist!
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!