McCain Doth Protest Too Much

McCain apparently had a staffer dispatched to Instapundit tout suite to claim that the CNet article about his "Shut Down The Blogs" proposal was a distortion, and he doesn't want to stymie free speech on the Internet. Maybe he should write a narrower law, then.

Digby notices that even the parts of the law that aren't about social networking sites are colossally stupid:

But what is most irritating about this latest absurd solution to a difficult problem is the fact that once again, you have idiots making policy about things of which they don't even have a basic understanding:

The other section of McCain's legislation targets convicted sex offenders. It would create a federal registry of "any e-mail address, instant-message address, or other similar Internet identifier" they use, and punish sex offenders with up to 10 years in prison if they don't supply it [..]

"This constitutionally dubious proposal is being made apparently mostly based on fear or political considerations rather than on the facts," said EFF's Bankston. Studies by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children show the online sexual solicitation of minors has dropped in the past five years, despite the growth of social-networking services, he said.

A McCain aide, who did not want to be identified by name, said on Friday that the measure was targeted at any Web site that "you'd have to join up or become a member of to use." No payment would be necessary to qualify, the aide added.

Yes. We're all issued an e-mail address at birth so a registry of such addresses will definitely make it impossible for sexual predators to operate on the internet. Maybe we could have a permanent web-cam embedded in their foreheads so that we could watch them while they type, too. And it's a good thing they're targeting the sites where you have to "sign up" because that will certainly put a stop to it.

Exactly. I probably have had 7 or 8 email addresses in my lifetime. Wait... I just signed up for another one. And another. You really think that you can put a hold on that?

I'm not defending sex offenders but these unenforceable, liberties-smashing laws in the name of protecting children not only overreach because they're politically popular, but they're totally ineffective and not even based on any kind of epidemic outside of Dateline NBC shows. In fact Internet predator statistics are often wildly misstated because it suits the goals of reactionary pandering politicians who want to whip up a fervor about the issue. If they really wanted to stop online predators, they might have walked over to the House of Representatives and gave the gentleman from Florida a buzz.

There are no cosponsors for this bill. As it should be. John McCain is digging his own grave, and declaring open war on the Internet. All for the sake of a few votes.