How long until the Bush fascists ban the internet?

[Stop_the_War]

Poll question: How long until the Bush fascists ban the internet?

[porphyrian]

1. Won't happen. They like their porn. - n/t

[independentchristian]

2. They are about to vote on a bill soon that will...

...tax the internet. Some groups are already attacking "blogs."

They're definitely starting down that road.

[JohnnyRingo]

3. Why ban when they can keep an eye on you without a search warrant

Of course they would wait for a "red flag" to begin surveilance, like posting on a "subversive message board"..... Like DU.

http://207.44.245.159/article8125.htm

If you're in the United States and reading this on the Internet, the Federal Bureau of Information (FBI)may be spying on you at this very moment.

Under provisions of the USA Patriot (Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism) Act, the Department of Justice has been collecting e-mail and IP (Internet protocol, a computer's unique numeric identifier) addresses, without a warrant, using trap-and-trace surveillance devices ("pen-traps"). Now, the FBI, Justice's principle investigative arm, may be monitoring the web-surfing habits of Internet users - also without a search warrant - that is, spying on you with no probable cause whatsoever.

In the wake of September 11, 2001, with the announcement of a potentially never-ending "war on terror" and in the name of "national security", the administration of President George W Bush embarked on a global campaign that left behind it two war-ravaged states (with up to 100,000 civilian dead in just one of them); an offshore "archipelago of injustice" replete with "ghost jails", and a seemingly endless series of cases of torture, abuse and the cold-blooded murder of prisoners. That was abroad. In the US, too, things have changed as America became "the Homeland" and an already powerful and bloated national security state developed a civilian corollary fed by fear-mongering, partisan politics, and an insatiable desire for governmental power, turf and budget.

[utahgirl]

4. asdf

I think they have to have it out of action or severely curtailed by the time they start ramping up for the 2008 election. Can't have all these internets running around telling the truth or organizing against things.

Possible alternatives:
crushing taxes on "collective" blogs
limiting bandwidth under some sort of ??FCC ruling
creating a licensing nightmare by new regulations
taxes on users making it too expensive for the poorer user to access services

Possible things to consider:
My guess is that anyone with a progressive blog should research foreign hosts. Canadian or European would be a start.

On your toes, folks. They'll try to slide it through on the back of something else.

utahgirl

[concord]

5. Tax and regulate - not ban

Why get rid of a profit tool? Our govt is in the business of business. It will be controlled to the best of their ability, but never banned.

[Stop_the_War]

6. okay I edited to include that option...

[mitchtv]

7. which internet? all of them?

.

[hootinholler]

8. They won't ban it, but render it...

Unuseable unless you're originating at an approved ISP. How? My wild assed prediction is DOS attacks.

-Hoot

[starroute]

9. They're try to domesticate it

They really want it to be a consumer medium, like television. Something where there's an audience that passively absorbs content and spends money. So they won't try to ban it -- just warp it.

One thing to look for is an increasing crackdown on file-sharing. They will either radically limit upload bandwidth or will try to crush things like Bittorrent that allow transfer of large amounts of information -- or both. And they will attempt to use Internet piracy laws to destroy people on the left who might threaten them.

Another thing to look out for would be mechanisms that preferentially steer searches towards large commercial and other approved sites while making it harder for blogs and small sites to get noticed. Google is far too democratic for them, and they may try to destroy it, coopt it, or overlod it.

A third -- which they're already trying -- is to limit freedom of speech on the Net through claims of violations of campaign finance reform by leftwing sites. They may also create fake scandals or exposures of personal information to undercut sites that raise money for left-wing causes and candidates and make people wary to donating to them.

If they can control the Net that 90% of the population sees -- while discrediting the other 10% and cutting it off from funding and influence -- they don't need to shut it down.

[Protagoras]

10. As long as they can set up small and distracting echo chambers

to help identify and marginalize the opposition, while quietly buying up all the popular sites and using those sites to spread their own corporatist propaganda, I'm sure the Internet will be seen as something which ultimately serves their purpose. They won't get rid of it unless they get bit in the ass in a way that far exceeds the minor (and perhaps intentionally distracting) Gannongate.