I can’t blame politicians and corporations for having the desire to control the internet. If they succeed in sneaking these laws past us, we have only ourselves to blame.
Interestingly enough, it seems like support for SOPA and PIPA — at least prior to Wednesday — was one of the few things congresscritters from both parties could agree on. Ah lobbyists!
“President Obama met with Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in the Oval Office yesterday. And after they left, Obama checked the White House to make sure Sasha and Malia were still there.” – Jimmy Fallon
“Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt visited the White House. There was an odd moment when they tried to adopt President Obama.” – Conan O’Brien
“Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt talked adoption with Obama at the White House. Obama said, ‘Could I interest you in a Biden?'” – Jimmy Fallon
“Mitt Romney told a crowd that he is half Mexican. Which means that half of him will not be voting for Mitt Romney.” – Conan O’Brien
“Experts say Mitt Romney needs Latino support in elections. Romney says, I’ll never pander to any group or mi nombre no es Mitt Romney.” – Jimmy Fallon
“A new tell-all book about Mitt Romney is coming out next week called ‘The Real Romney.’ You can tell the book is based on Romney. After 300 pages, the last line is, “Actually I just changed my mind about all of that.'” – Jimmy Fallon
“Rick Perry’s presidential campaign is in trouble. So, they’re now selling his merchandise two for one. You get a foam finger, a key chain and I forget the third thing.” – Jimmy Fallon
“Researchers found a frog in new guinea that is so tiny, they believe it’s the smallest vertebrate on the planet. It has the tiniest backbone of any living creature, except members of Congress.” – Jay Leno
“Yoga-related injuries are on the rise. People sit in chairs all day at work, then they twist into pretzels and expect it to be easy. It’s like being a brainless action star all your life, then going out and trying to govern the state of California.” – Craig Ferguson
“Mayor Bloomberg wants to outlaw alcohol in New York City. How about outlawing rats in the subway?” – David Letterman
“The State Department issued a new travel warning yesterday, urging U.S. citizens to avoid Syria. Yeah, it was part of a new set of warnings called, ‘Things you were probably doing already.'” – Jimmy Fallon
“In North Korea, they announced they’re going to embalm Kim Jong Il’s body and put it on display just like Russia did with Lenin and America did with Larry King.” – Craig Ferguson
“A report from the Department of Homeland Security says they regularly monitor social networking sites, like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. So that’s who is looking at MySpace, I guess.” – Jimmy Kimmel
The mainstream media loves a good horse race, and they are sure getting one in the Republican primaries. Just a couple of days ago, Romney had won two races and was on his way to a double-digit knockout in South Carolina. But it looks like he might get Rickrolled.
Today Iowa finally announced their official totals, and Romney’s 8-vote unofficial win there flipped (how apropos) to a 34 vote win for Rick Santorum.
The other Rick, governor Perry, announced today that he is leaving the race and throwing his support to Newt Gingrich.
Plus Mitt seems to be doing himself no favors with his non-answer on releasing his income tax information.
As the media says, stay tuned.
UPDATE: The South Carolina primary is happening today, and several pundits say Gingrich will probably win it. But Romney is still ahead in Florida and will still likely take the nomination.
I’d like this comic even better if the money bags sitting behind the Congress character was the money thrown at Congresscritters by lobbyists (like all the money they get from the MPAA, the Chamber of Commerce, and other organizations pushing the SOPA and PIPA bills). To their credit, most Internet companies have been reluctant to do a lot of lobbying, preferring instead to let their products and job creation record speak for themselves.
I also think the old media companies (represented by the MPAA and RIAA) were caught off-guard by the new media companies (who are just figuring out how to turn their huge ability to rapidly marshall grass roots support into political power).
UPDATE: Stephen Colbert hilariously claims that the internet has too much control over what’s on the web:
“Congratulations to Mitt Romney. He won the New Hampshire primary last night. See, this is proof that even the multi-millionaire son of a multi-millionaire can beat the odds and run for president of the United States.” – Jay Leno
“The thing I don’t like about Romney is that he’s not funny. For a while, the field was looking promising for late night comedians.” – Craig Ferguson
“I’m having trouble warming up to Mitt Romney. He looks like the guy in the restaurant that comes to your table to make sure everything’s all right.” – David Letterman
“Seventy-six percent of people polled thought that Mitt was short for mittens. I’d vote for him if his name was Mittens Romney. Other nations would fear us for being so adorable.” – Craig Ferguson
“Mitt Romney won the New Hampshire primary. Romney’s win in New Hampshire means that he received seven delegates and a wagon full of maple syrup.” – Craig Ferguson
“Nation, unless you live in a cave, I’m sure you’ve heard that yesterday’s New Hampshire primary was won by Mitt Romney. And if you do live in a cave, I’m guessing you voted for Ron Paul.” – Stephen Colbert
“Ron Paul finished second. … Paul says if he can sustain those kind of numbers … and if his message continues to resonate … and if Mitt Romney gets hit with a dump truck, he could still win this thing.” –Jimmy Kimmel
“Ron Paul said he’s ‘nibbling at Mitt Romney’s heels.’ At 76 years old, I hope somebody’s cutting Romney’s heels into bite-sized pieces for him.” – Craig Ferguson
“In a speech, Ron Paul described himself to the crowd as ‘dangerous.’ Yeah, then one of his handlers fed him some warm milk through an eye dropper and he fell asleep in a shoebox.” – Conan O’Brien
“Jon Huntsman finished third … and he said he’s happy with the momentum he gained this week. You know it’s got to be fun being a politician. You can spin everything. … Your plane is crashing and you’re saying, ‘We’re happy to be landing ahead of schedule.'” – Jay Leno
“Rick Perry was philosophical about it. He said, ‘Last week was Iowa. Yesterday was New Hampshire. ‘ He said at least it’s giving him a chance to learn the names of all the states.” – Jay Leno
“After Iowa and New Hampshire, Mitt Romney’s campaign is now two for two. After his performance last night, Rick Perry’s campaign merchandise is now two for one.” – Jimmy Fallon
“This GOP race is heating up with the intensity of an Easy-Bake Oven.” –Jimmy Kimmel
“Fidel Castro posted a blog entry this week titled ‘The Best President.’ Castro thinks a robot would do a better job than President Obama. And if Mitt Romney wins, that could happen.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“With all due respect, Castro, we tried the robot thing here in California. And it didn’t work out.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Yesterday Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt stopped by the White House. There was an awkward moment when they tried to adopt President Obama.” –Conan O’Brien
“According to the tabloids, John Edwards is going to marry his mistress, Rielle Hunter. Which means, of course, now he has to find a new mistress, and the whole thing starts again.” – Jay Leno
Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert continue to not coordinate the activities of their super PAC. And make fun of our totally bizarre and corrupt election laws:
The Christian Science Monitor says it is all completely legal.
In addition, Colbert’s super PAC is running a new ad in South Carolina, encouraging voters to vote for Herman Cain in the primary. Colbert was far too late to get on the South Carolina ballot, however, Cain is still on the ballot even though he dropped out of the race in December. To his credit, Cain responded “I find it very clever and humorous, as it should be. Anyone who finds what Mr. Colbert is doing offensive should simply lighten up.”
I won’t be posting any articles on Wednesday, in support of the Internet strike against PIPA and SOPA.
Meanwhile, go read this article by Andrew Sullivan “How Obama’s Long Game Will Outsmart His Critics”. It is brilliant.
On Wednesday, several major internet sites are going on strike. So if you try to access Wikipedia, Reddit, Craigslist, The Oatmeal, Boing Boing, Mozilla, MoveOn, or hundreds of other sites, you may be out of luck. Some sites, including Google, ArsTechnica, TechCrunch, WordPress, and Wired, have a notice on their main page, but will allow users to click through to the real site.
What has the internet up in arms? Two bills in Congress — PIPA and SOPA — claim they are about protecting intellectual property rights, but they threaten to impose draconian censorship and legal requirements on web sites. Many people believe that if either of these bills become law, they could cause many legitimate websites to close because of the burdens involved. Indeed, I am not sure I could continue running this website if either of these bills pass.
Not only that, but the bills are so poorly written that they don’t even accomplish the goal of protecting intellectual property.
We’ve seen this kind of thing in the past. Remember when the television industry tried to outlaw video recorders because they could be used to record copyrighted material? [By the way, the link in that last sentence goes to an article on Wikipedia, which will be blacked out on Wednesday. Sorry.]
But this post is not here to convince you that these two bills could destroy the internet as we know it. I just want to point out some irony.
The first is that the Congressman who wrote SOPA was found to be infringing copyright on his own website, making him guilty of violating his own (poorly written) law.
It is also interesting that the mainstream media (whose corporate owners are largely in favor of these two bills) was almost completely silent on these bills until the internet got up in arms. The goal was apparently to get them passed without anyone noticing. It didn’t work.
UPDATE: Book publisher Tim O’Reilly, who is one of the people bills like SOPA and PIPA are supposed to protect, has a good article on why he is against them.
UPDATE 2: The protest seems to be working — at least three Congresscritters who were co-sponsors of the bills have withdrawn their support. And here’s an article listing the sites that have gone dark in protest.
UPDATE 3: One more irony — I keep hearing people say that copyright violations are theft. Just today, Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) said “Stealing content is theft, plain and simple.” Actually, it is neither stealing nor theft, according to the Supreme Court.
Legislator co-sponsoring a bill requiring drug testing for welfare recipients — Normal Republican tactics.
Same legislator getting arrested for DUI — Normal Republican hypocrisy.
When arrested, the legislator was driving his gold four-door Jaguar XJ8 — Priceless.
What makes this even more ironic is that when the Republican bill to require welfare recipients to be tested for drug use was introduced, a Democratic legislator filed a similar bill to require that all state legislators submit to similar testing.
This would explain a lot.
Even in the best of times, politicians (like diplomats) have an uncomfortable relationship with the truth. There is a certain tension between a politician’s need to follow the wishes of their electorate, and the need to actually, you know, lead. But Mitt Romney seems to be especially willing to act like a well-oiled wind vane in order to get elected.
Are Romney’s words and actions really at odds with his religious faith?
I guess the thing that worries me the most about Romney, however, is not something I’ve seen mentioned much. Do we really need another president who grew up in the shadow of his successful father, and seems willing to do almost anything to prove himself and measure up?
Call me crazy, but the fact that Jon Huntsman couldn’t get any traction at all with Republican voters and is now dropping out of the race, shows how bankrupt the Republican party has become.
It is ironic that the day Huntsman announced he was withdrawing from the race was the same day he was endorsed by South Carolina’s largest newspaper. They endorsed him because Huntsman was “more principled, has a far more impressive resume and offers a significantly more important message.” Actually, it seems to me that Huntsman was the only candidate who had a message, other than the message of the other “Party of No” candidates who seem to simply against anything and everything Obama has done.
Huntsman distinguished himself from the other Republican candidates by running a largely positive campaign, spending “more of his time in debates pushing his own views for improving the economy than thumping the president or his opponents.” As Huntsman put it himself “I don’t think you need to run down somebody’s reputation in order to run for the office of president.”
But the fact that he had served the Obama administration as Ambassador to China tainted Huntsman. What kind of political party views serving your country as “working on behalf of the opposition”? Has partisanship become so much more important than love for your country?
Huntsman was also ignored by conservatives because he was unwilling to kiss up to the radical right. Huntsman was the kind of conservative I respect — a fiscal conservative who also believes in science. What kind of party rejects a candidate because he openly believes in evolution, and listens to scientists when they warn us about global warming?
In the end, Huntsman didn’t have what it takes to be a Republican candidate, which seems to be a consuming message of hate, a willingness to change your principles to kowtow to the radical right, and lots and lots of corporate money to spend.
UPDATE: Huntsman ended his press conference Sunday by saying “This race has degenerated into an onslaught of negative attacks not worthy of the American people and not worthy of this critical time. At its core, the Republican Party is a party of ideas, but the current toxic form of our political discourse does not help our cause.” Amen.
I just have to add, I can’t figure out why nobody (neither the media or the voters) paid much attention to Huntsman. He is photogenic and charismatic, making him a good opponent for Obama. He had a stunning 90% approval rating as governor of Utah, one of the reddest and most conservative states in the US. As a moderate, he also appeals to independents; critical to winning a presidential election. Time magazine called him “the Republican Democrats fear most” and Obama’s campaign manager said that the prospect of facing Huntsman in 2012 made him “a wee bit queasy”. Critics say that he didn’t have enough name recognition, but that didn’t stop Republicans from supporting Sarah Palin. Do you have to be a nutcase to get attention in the Republican party?
I’ve often wondered why nobody calls out the Republican party for claiming to be the party of small government. It isn’t like there isn’t plenty of data to refute this claim. We have long known that the federal deficit has increased dramatically more under Republican presidents than Democratic ones, but Republicans could just claim that they increased the deficit through tax cuts, not by spending.
But that would be a lie. A more interesting measure of the size of government would be the size of the federal workforce (not including military personnel) — data that is easily available online.
So the next time a Republican candidate claims to be a Reagan conservative, just remember that not only did Reagan increase the deficit by more than 200 billion dollars and raise taxes multiple times, he also increased the federal workforce by 238,000 employees (8.3%).
The latest data we have is for the end of 2010, but the total number of federal employees is still smaller than it was when Reagan took office 30 years ago, even though the US population has grown more than 45% during that time.
Bottom line — under the last three Democratic presidents (Carter, Clinton, Obama), the federal workforce was reduced by 304,000 employees; while under the last three Republican presidents (Reagan, Bush I, Bush II) the federal workforce was increased by 261,000 employees.
Which one is the party of small government?
“Fidel Castro declared that a robot would do a better job as president than Barack Obama. After hearing this, Mitt Romney thanked Castro for his endorsement.” – Conan O’Brien
“Mitt Romney says he understands the middle class, and that he knows it’s not easy keeping a roof over your family’s heads — as well as vacation roofs in San Diego, New Hampshire, and Park City, Utah.” – Jay Leno
“Mitt Romney said that he liked to fire people. Well, there’s a pretty good message to send to Middle America.” – David Letterman
“When Rick Perry heard that, he said, ‘Well that’s nothing. I like to execute people.'” – David Letterman
“Mitt Romney is saying his comments about liking to fire people were taken out of context. Yeah, what he actually said was he likes to set poor people on fire.” – Conan O’Brien
“I came up with a great slogan for Romney. “It’s time to Mitt or get off the pot.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“In New Hampshire, the Republican primary election took place. New Hampshire voters gathered to decide which middle-aged white guy looked best in a pair of pleated Dockers.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Mitt Romney had a huge lead going into the primary. It would’ve taken a miraculous, divinely-inspired comeback for anyone to defeat him. So let me be the first to say congratulations, President Tim Tebow.” – Craig Ferguson
“You know the difference between Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, and Tim Tebow? When God tells Tim Tebow to run, he wins.” – Jay Leno
“The New Hampshire primary is a tough one for the candidates who don’t do well because this is the night when many of them realize, ‘I served all those people pancakes for nothing.'” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Newt Gingrich thinks he’s the man for the job. He got an important endorsement from Sarah Palin’s husband, Todd. He has the all-important ‘snowmobilers who wear sunglasses indoors’ demographic.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“During the debates I drank a shot every time I heard the word ‘contraception.’ I was more wasted than a contribution to Jon Huntsman.” – Stephen Colbert
“While campaigning yesterday, Jon Huntsman said he was ‘ready to rock and roll.’ Not to be outdone, Mitt Romney said he was ready to ‘easy listen.'” – Jimmy Fallon
“In Saturday night’s Republican debate, Jon Huntsman spoke Chinese. Why Chinese? If you want to reach the American people, you’ve got to speak Spanish.” – Jay Leno
“I make my choice for president based on how well each candidate would handle an alien invasion.” – Jimmy Kimmel
“Word that John Edwards is marrying his mistress Rielle Hunter. You know what that means: Now, he’s got to find another mistress.” – Jay Leno
The super PAC formerly run by Stephen Colbert and now run by Jon Stewart has released their first political ad, which it will air in South Carolina this week. And it is a doozy:
I love the use of John Lithgow as the narrator (who recently played a serial killer on TV).
You should also read the press release for the ad from “The Definitely Not Coordinated With Stephen Colbert Super PAC” (formerly and officially known as “Americans For A Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow”).
UPDATE: Colbert proves that his campaign is not coordinating with his former Super PAC:
I remember when I was young, it was not uncommon for some people to say things that were racist, even out loud in public. The civil rights movement managed to make it unacceptable for people to be explicitly racist, but it didn’t get rid of racism itself. Those people just found more socially acceptable ways to be racist.
There are plenty of examples of this, including Nixon with his “Southern Strategy“, the “War on Drugs”, which targets drugs popular with Blacks. Heck, I’m strongly in favor of pushing power down from the federal level to the state level, but I can’t even use the phrase “states’ rights” because it has become a loaded term synonymous with opposing civil rights.
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