The Cognitive Dissonance, It Burns

Here are just three unrelated, and yet somehow related, stories, that make me wonder how any Republican can keep all these ideas in their head without it exploding.

• The fiscally responsible House GOP, always railing against how President Obama is spending "the people's money," is funding their re-branding effort with taxpayer dollars by using Eric Cantor's House account.

• Bill O'Reilly, who has made a cottage industry out of ambushing liberals by directing reporters to accost them on the street, actually recorded a video where he decries the loss of privacy from public figures. Really.



• And in the most insane example, Rush Limbaugh tries to explain the "quest for power" by a group other than him, in this case the Democratic Party, by referring to his own drug addiction, assuming of course that every single person in the party has exactly the same obsessions as, well, him.



I really don't even know what to say about that one.

Let's Chip In And Fund Amanda Terkel's Harrassment Lawsuit

This is some creepy business by Bill O'Reilly's goons, which Papa Bear somehow sees appropriate because the subject holds separate views than he does, although I think the authorities would beg to differ. This looks actionable to me.

• The Stalking: Watters and his camera man accosted me at approximately 3:45 p.m. on Saturday, March 21, in Winchester, VA, which is a two-hour drive from Washington, DC. My friend and I were in this small town for a short weekend vacation and had told no one about where we were going. I can only infer that the two men staked out my apartment and then followed me for two hours. Looking back, my friend and I remember seeing their tan SUV following us for much of the trip.

• The Ambush: Shortly after checking into our lodgings, we emerged and immediately saw two men walking toward us calling out my name. Watters said he was from Fox News, but never said his or his companion’s name, nor did he say he was with The O’Reilly Factor.

• The Surprise Attack: Watters immediately began asking me why I was causing “pain and suffering” to the Alexa Foundation. He never gave me the context for his questions. Confused, I repeatedly asked him what he was talking about and whether he could refresh my memory, but he just continued shouting his question.

• The Evasion: I said that it was inappropriate for O’Reilly to imply that just because a woman may be drunk and/or dressed in a certain way, she should expect to be raped. Watters asked me whether I had listened to the interview (which I had) and claimed that O’Reilly had made the comments in the context of a commentary on Mel Gibson/drunkenness. When I tried to ascertain why he was attacking ThinkProgress in particular — even though other sites had also covered the story — he said that we were part of the “smear pipeline,” which also included the “Soros-funded” Media Matters. He ignored my comments when I asked if Fox News also smears people.

• Setting A Guilt Trap: Watters ended the charade by demanding that I look into the camera and apologize to the Alexa Foundation and rape victims. I told them that I don’t speak through Fox News and if someone from the Alexa Foundation would like to personally call me, I’d be happy to speak with that person.

• More Stalking: The camera man then continued to film me as I walked down the block. After a few minutes while I waited at the light to cross the street, Watters called him back and they left.

Somehow O'Reilly considers himself a defender of privacy despite all this. And KO released a primer last year on how to deal with this: the key words are Mackris, Loofahs and Malmedy.



You never know when this will come in handy.

Facebook Appears To Really Want To Be Evil

So here's the umpteenth case of Facebook trying to violate the privacy of their customers, getting called on it, and then backpedaling. Amazingly, their Chief PRIVACY Officer, surely in on all these deals, wants to run for Attorney General of California. Yeah, good luck with that.

The New York Times has a good profile of the whole sordid story, as well as a hat tip to The Consumerist, the blog that broke the story.

Looking forward to two years from now, when Facebook is as much of a ghost town as Friendster.

DiFi Tries To Hand Corporations A Giveaway In The Stimulus

The final numbers on the stimulus package are trickling out. Some of the baseline investments are here:

* Investments in Infrastructure and Science - $120 billion
* Investments in Health - $14.2 billion
* Investments in Education and Training - $105.9 billion
* Investments in Energy, including over $30 billion in infrastructure - $37.5 billion
* Helping Americans Hit Hardest by the Economic Crisis - $24.3 billion
* Law Enforcement, Oversight, Other Programs - $7.8 billion

It's unquestionable that the conference report is worse than the House bill but better than the Senate. It costs less than the Senate bill while providing more stimulus. Some bad spending like the clean coal "FutureGen" project is out, along with some of the worst corporate tax breaks. Mass transit spending is up, the child tax credit was partially restored to House levels (now kicking in after $3,000 in income), and the state fiscal stabilization fund gets around $54 million (but that includes funding for school construction). You can find the full summary here.

There are some very solid elements to the bill. White House economists estimate that the package will create or save 396,000 jobs in California and 3.5 million nationwide. This is a down payment on a new generation of investment in America.

However, like with most Congressional sausage-making, there may be some rough patches. The worst is the allegation that Dianne Feinstein is trying to include filtering into the stimulus as part of the program to expand broadband capacity across the country.

The Open Internet Coalition - which includes groups like Public Knowledge, Free Press and the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) - is applauding the more than $2 billion expected to be in the stimulus bill for broadband build-out in rural or underserved areas. They say not only will building out high-speed Internet instantly create jobs, but giving people in those areas more access to the Internet will spur small-business creation and other growth [...]

These groups are also over-the-moon about the fact that the Senate bill has a non-discrimination, interconnection requirement that essentially says any provider receiving stimulus funding has to make sure they provide equal access to everyone over their network (part of the so-called "net neutrality" debate). The House version requires the FCC to define "open access," which essentially calls for carriers to share their networks with competitors.

But they're worried Hollywood is still trying to insert a content filtering provision via Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., at the last minute. Feinstein has been trying to add language specifying that Internet service provider (ISPs) may engage in "reasonable network management" ... "such as" efforts to combat illegal activity like "child pornography and copyright infringement." In essence, some argue, ISPs would be able to monitor any content coming to and from your computer, just in case there was some copyrighted material violating fair use, or kiddie porn in there.

But groups like the Motion Picture Association of America stress the "network management" angle of the bill ("filtering" is a nasty word around these parts). After all, it's hard to argue against stopping kiddie porn from being sent over one's pipes. I've left a message with Feinstein's press office to see what the status of her amendment is. It doesn't appear to be in there, but I'll let you know if she plans on trying to stick it in at some point.

"Of course we see huge privacy invasions from this sort of thing," said Cathy Sloan of CCIA.

Now, some caveats. There was a hyperventilating story in the UK Register claiming that this would kill net neutrality. As stated earlier, there are open access provisions in the stimulus, and it doesn't appear that this amendment even made it into the final version. This looks to me to be more of a privacy and anti-competition issue.

In another part of that story, Henry Waxman was implicated. His office has assured multiple constituents, including yours truly, that he has had nothing to do with any filtering amendment.

That's not to say that we shouldn't be concerned. DiFi is allegedly trying to pay back a corporate constituent with a highly invasive amendment that would certainly violate the spirit if not the letter of privacy laws. And of course this kind of monitoring is a slippery slope, as are most IP issues. At the root I agree with John Cole:

As baseball season is getting close, I would like to propose a trade. We give the Republicans Dianne Feinstein and a PTBNL and they give us Olympia Snowe. This is a solid trade for us. With Judd Gregg at commerce, we would almost complete the New England rout, and Feinstein, as a newly minted Republican, will go down to certain defeat in California. Additionally, there is nothing in this agreement that says the PTBNL can’t be Nelson or Lieberman.

Not Only Ignorant, But Destructive

It's not just that Sarah Palin can't name another Supreme Court case besides Roe v. Wade - wait, OK, it is that. But there's something more here, something that will offend the intelligence of more than merely all rational Americans. She believes in the Constitutional right to privacy.

Couric Why, in your view, is Roe v. Wade a bad decision?

Sarah Palin: I think it should be a states' issue not a federal government-mandated, mandating yes or no on such an important issue. I'm, in that sense, a federalist, where I believe that states should have more say in the laws of their lands and individual areas. Now, foundationally, also, though, it's no secret that I'm pro-life that I believe in a culture of life is very important for this country. Personally that's what I would like to see, um, further embraced by America.

Couric: Do you think there's an inherent right to privacy in the Constitution?

Palin: I do. Yeah, I do.

Couric: The cornerstone of Roe v. Wade.

Palin: I do. And I believe that individual states can best handle what the people within the different constituencies in the 50 states would like to see their will ushered in an issue like that.

I don't know if she believes in the right to privacy or if she believes in the words "right" and "privacy" and saw them together and took a stab at it. But this is a major, MAJOR no-no for the fundies and the wingnuts. She undermined the entire intellectual argument against Roe without even recognizing it. Taking her logic (if it can be called that), if there's a Constitutional right to privacy then there's a right to keep medical decisions confidential, not a state's right but a fundamental Constitutional right.

This is about 35 years' worth of arguments crashing down right now. If any backlash could cost her the nomination it would be over this. This reaches into Harriet Miers territory.

On a couple other notes:

1) Given that Palin is now personally responsible for saving Katie Couric's job, is there any kickback scheme in the offing?

2) Given that the gobbledy-gook answers that randomly generate at InterviewPalin.com are actually starting to be less surreal than what comes out of her mouth, have we reached a subject that is invulnerable to parody?

3) Do we really know whether or not Sarah Palin is Sacha Baron Cohen's greatest role?

A Couple Senators Holding Back The Surveillance Dam

Sen. Dodd is actually on the floor of the Senate right now beginning his and Sen. Feingold's filibuster of the FISA bill. I refuse to get my hopes up for this, but it's notable that they're trying. Dodd is thundering away, too, making us all proud. The tactic here has to be to delay this thing as long as they can, because outright stopping it is next to impossible given the numbers.

It's pretty clear the fix is in. Money is flowing to those who flipped on telecom immunity as fast as possible. For the phone companies, it's a small price to pay - while liability wouldn't bankrupt them, it'd be a bigger hit than the pennies they're spending to bribe legislators.

And the truth is that the federal government, on a bipartisan basis, is largely indifferent to their constituent's privacy. Since 9-11 the situation has gotten far worse, but the surveillance state has been building for decades.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

* No right to privacy in constitution, though search and seizure protections exist in 4th Amendment; case law on government searches has considered new technology
* No comprehensive privacy law, many sectoral laws; though tort of privacy
* FTC continues to give inadequate attention to privacy issues, though issued self-regulating privacy guidelines on advertising in 2007
* State-level data breach legislation has proven to be useful in identifying faults in security
* REAL-ID and biometric identification programs continue to spread without adequate oversight, research, and funding structures
* Extensive data-sharing programs across federal government and with private sector
* Spreading use of CCTV
* Congress approved presidential program of spying on foreign communications over U.S. networks, e.g. Gmail, Hotmail, etc.; and now considering immunity for telephone companies, while government claims secrecy, thus barring any legal action
* No data retention law as yet, but equally no data protection law
* World leading in border surveillance, mandating trans-border data flows
* Weak protections of financial and medical privacy; plans spread for ‘rings of steel’ around cities to monitor movements of individuals
* Democratic safeguards tend to be strong but new Congress and political dynamics show that immigration and terrorism continue to leave politicians scared and without principle
* Lack of action on data breach legislation on the federal level while REAL-ID is still compelled upon states has shown that states can make informed decisions
* Recent news regarding FBI biometric database raises particular concerns as this could lead to the largest database of biometrics around the world that is not protected by strong privacy law

So go ahead and make calls to your Senators, and they'll be tracked (by a lot of people), but we have a ruling class that has invaded your privacy more and more over the years. All for your protection, of course. The daddies in Washington want you to know they have an eye on the bad guys for you. Problem is, they think you are the bad guy.

This isn't likely to be stopped until those of us committed to civil liberties can make our political power manifest. Here's a way to work on that:



UPDATE: Senator Reid just informed his colleagues on the Senate floor that, because of all the other bills in the queue (like the housing bill, and the Iraq supplemental), FISA may not get a vote until after the July 4 holiday recess.

This is honestly the best we can hope for with this bill. Sens. Dodd, Wyden and Feingold are ready to filibuster and gamely trying to get colleagues to do the same (Sen. Dodd's speech tonight was a bravura performance), but realistically there aren't the numbers for cloture. However, that could change if the delay continues. And getting this to the recess means being able to get in a lot of Senator's faces on their trips back home. In addition, there's going to be a very short window in August where a ton of must-pass bills have to get through Congress, and throwing FISA in with that mess means that anything can happen.

I believe this is an acknowledgement from Sen. Reid that he finds the housing bill and the Iraq supplemental (which includes unmployment benefits extension and the GI Bill) to be more important than FISA, and so he's going to prioritize. I don't think it means anything more than that. Overall, the fix is still in. All we can do is keep trying to delay.

Passport-gate: Officially Over (UPDATE: Or Not?)

Since this Obama passport thing broke, I've been trying to figure out what's in a passport file and why that information would be useful. It would, I assume, have dates and places visited, and maybe if the passport holder checked in at embassies in various countries. But what else? When Bill Clinton's passport file was violated in 1991, the spin put out from the RNC was that they were looking for a letter Clinton wrote to a US Embassy abroad asking to renounce his citizenship. Only that wasn't true, and it wasn't in the file.

UPDATE: My assumption was not so hot. Computerworld has a primer:

What exactly is a passport record? A passport record typically consists of applications made by a person for a U.S. passport, together with supporting evidence of U.S. citizenship. The records include details such as date and place of birth, naturalization details, family status, occupation and physical characteristics. Passport records do not include evidence of travel, such as exit and entrance stamps, visas or residence permits. Passport records are protected by the Privacy Act of 1974 [...]

What else is in the system? In addition to passport applications and the related material, the system stores investigative reports that might have been compiled in connection with granting or denying a passport, or in connection with any violation of passport criminal statutes. It also stores court documents and administrative determinations related to passports and citizenship, as well as copies of birth and baptismal certificates, medical, personal and financial reports and details on arrest warrants of the person applying for, extending or renewing a passport and a person's Social Security number.

OK, so there's some stuff in there that's pretty noteworthy. It's not in every file, however; the investigative reports aren't necessary made in every case. The Social Security number is in that file, and certainly that could be used for all sorts of mischief, like obtaining personal financial records and the like. But you could pretty easily determine if those records were obtained, and I'm hoping that the appropriate authorities are doing so.

So now that we've seen that Hillary Clinton's file was breached as well, and that MSNBC is reporting the same about John McCain, this really feels to me like a bunch of cube rats in the State Department snooping around on their lunch breaks, doing some info-snacking. It's against the law, and their names should be released and the investigation should be held outside the State Department's Inspector General, especially considering that there is no State Department Inspector General at the moment, but I'm not seeing the advantage you could gain here. There's a ridiculous diary on Daily Kos intimating that the Clinton campaign had something to do with this, a fact-free "guilt by association" piece of tripe that really is sad, and as we've learned, foreign travel ISN'T EVEN IN A PASSPORT FILE. The level of critical inquiry in this campaign season is well and truly in the toilet.

I think this story is more telling about how much personal information the government has on you and how unsecure it all is. Which comes at precisely the time when the Bushes want the ability to wiretap on Americans without a warrant. This should spark total outrage with the national surveillance state.

UPDATE: The fact that one of the guys who looked at Obama's information also looked at McCain's leaves open the possibility that someone is selling information of political candidates. There's enough information in that file that would be of interest to oppo researchers. This could be an inside job to funnel info to a shop that digs up all sorts of dirt.

It's Not War When One Side Doesn't Need To Fight

The Clinton campaign is fighting a battle in the media to ensure that the "Obama is winning" narrative doesn't take hold. That's what this is all about. The numbers pretty clearly show that it's likely Obama will be ahead in pledged delegates by the end of the nominating process. So the Clintons are resorting to spin - and bad spin, at that.

Strategists said in a conference call with reporters the campaign will go after delegates wherever they can be found -- including in Michigan and Florida. They also said Clinton will likely be within 25 delegates of Obama after voting on March 4, including superdelegates, and they dismissed most states which Obama has won.

“Could we possibly have a nominee who hasn't won any of the significant states -- outside of Illinois?” Chief Strategist Mark Penn said. “That raises some serious questions about Sen. Obama.”

There is something to be said for the adage that you govern the way you campaign. The Clinton campaign is dedicated to an 18-state strategy where you need a triple-bank shot to get lucky on election day, and she'll probably govern that way, too, foregrounding the big states as necessarily more important and doing little to promote Democrats outside of them. The Obama campaign is running hard everywhere, and are most likely to continue Howard Dean's 50-state strategy. I don't think they would ever call a state, or its citizens, "insignificant."

Then there's this article, which suggests that the Clinton camp knows that they'll be down in pledged delegates but will try to win with superdelegates.

WASHINGTON -- Hillary Clinton will take the Democratic nomination even if she does not win the popular vote, but persuades enough superdelegates to vote for her at the convention, her campaign advisers say.

The New York senator, who lost three primaries Tuesday night, now lags slightly behind her rival, Illinois Senator Barack Obama, in the delegate count. She is even further behind in "pledged'' delegates, those assigned by virtue of primaries and caucuses.

But Clinton will not concede the race to Obama if he wins a greater number of pledged delegates by the end of the primary season, and will count on the 796 elected officials and party bigwigs to put her over the top, if necessary, said Clinton's communications director, Howard Wolfson.

This is a public plea for the superdelegates already in her camp to stay with her, nothing more. As I've said, it is highly unlikely that Democratic activists (and that's who a lot of the superdelegates are) would subvert the will of the people. That's actually not how they operate and not who they are. The 400 or so who haven't endorsed are a bloc less than they are individuals. They will head to the frontrunner like flies to a lamp.

This is nothing more than spin, from a campaign that is reeling. Josh Green's Atlantic story and Michelle Cottle's New Republic story are important for context here. The campaign has a lot of freelancing and backbiting, and also made as the signature of their effort the theme of inevitability. Well, this is what you get when things start to fall apart: more backbiting, and spin masquerading as inevitability.

Only in the Obama campaign, the fish ain't biting. While supporters may be up in arms about this, they are running their race, using their metrics, and generally working for the knockout punch. I think it's significant that Obama gave his speech on the economy yesterday at the GM plant in Janesville, hometown of Sen. Russ Feingold. Obama is trying to cut into Clinton's advantages among swing liberals and working-class populists to pave the way to the White House. While the Clinton campaign tries to bully the press.

The "govern how you campaign" theme came to a head for me yesterday with a couple things. One was that revelation in the Green article that Clinton herself was pretty insulated from the problems that were going on inside the campaign, and approving of her now-fired campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle out of loyalty, both characteristics which are trademarks of the current President. And then there's the unseemliness of this:

Last year, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton took the unusual step of renting out some of her lists. The transaction once again highlights the Clintons' connections to a businessman who now faces questions from the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Reports from Clinton's campaign show that on Dec. 3, it collected payment for renting out three mailing lists, the sale of which netted them $8,225.

But most intriguing of all was the renter of the Clinton list: a list brokerage company that is a subsidiary of one of the data-collection industry titans, Info U.S.A.

Info U.S.A.'s CEO is Vinod Gupta, a close ally of both Clintons. Gupta's empire also includes the Opinion Research Corporation, which conducts the political polling for the television network CNN.

Vin Gupta has a long history of giving and raising campaign money for the Clintons, and gave $1 million for the 2000 Millennium Celebration, a New Year's Party thrown by the Clintons.

I wouldn't want my personal information just handed over to some ally for money. It looks like an in-kind contribution, for one, and it violates privacy laws in place to protect against this kind of thing, at least in theory.

So, to sum up: the Clinton campaign isn't "declaring war" because it would be like Micronesia declaring war on America; their campaign is in a lot of trouble and these are the kind of statements made when that happened; it presages the fact that Clinton doesn't appear to be a very good manager and is willing to step right up to the ethical line; this could still be all over by March 4 no matter what Howard Wolfson or Mark Penn say.

UPDATE: Ezra:

This demonstrates not only a gross ruthlessness on the part of Clinton's campaign, but an astonishingly cavalier attitude towards the preservation of the progressive coalition. To be willing to blithely rip it to shreds in order to wrest a nomination that's not been fairly earned is not only low, but a demonstration of deeply pernicious priorities -- namely, it's an explicit statement that the campaign puts its own political success above the health of the party and the pursuit of progressive goals, and one can't but help assume that's exactly the attitude they would take towards governance, too.

I agree that they're trying to be ruthless, but the DNC is a self-preservation outfit and I can't see its members going along with ripping the party asunder when the alternative is to nominate a perfectly good candidate in Barack Obama. The rest I agree with as well.

The New Meaning Of Probable Cause

"Do you want a warrant?"

"Probably."

"Why?"

"'Cause."

Federal officials are routinely asking courts to order cellphone companies to furnish real-time tracking data so they can pinpoint the whereabouts of drug traffickers, fugitives and other criminal suspects, according to judges and industry lawyers.

In some cases, judges have granted the requests without requiring the government to demonstrate that there is probable cause to believe that a crime is taking place or that the inquiry will yield evidence of a crime. Privacy advocates fear such a practice may expose average Americans to a new level of government scrutiny of their daily lives.

Such requests run counter to the Justice Department's internal recommendation that federal prosecutors seek warrants based on probable cause to obtain precise location data in private areas. The requests and orders are sealed at the government's request, so it is difficult to know how often the orders are issued or denied.

Only us "civil liberties extremists" are worried about this, I guess.

By the way, Justice Department, I'll be out at dinner, but since my cell phone is with me, YOU ALREADY KNEW THAT.

Federal Judge - Hey Bush, Hang On To Those Emails

The primaries are around the corner, but there's still a lot of loose threads with the criminal lawbreaking of the current Administration, and today, there was some movement on one front.

A federal judge Monday ordered the White House to preserve copies of all its e-mails, a move that Bush administration lawyers had argued strongly against.

U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy directed the Executive Office of the President to safeguard the material in response to two lawsuits that seek to determine whether the White House has destroyed e-mails in violation of federal law.

This is key for a couple of reasons.

For one, we still haven't gotten to the bottom of what happened to 5 million magical disappearing emails, and ensuring oversight will prevent this and future Administrations from trying that trick again, as well as strengthening the fight to actually find those emails destroyed since 2003, by getting the courts on the record that this is a crime in violation of the Federal Records Act. The White House may now have to explain in a public setting what happened to those prior missing emails. We don't even know what those emails relate to, but it's likely they have at least something to do with the Valerie Plame case, as the dates line up with when then-White House Counsel Abu Gonzales was told to preserve all relevant documents and then didn't inform the staff officially until 12 hours later.

The second reason that this ruling has broad relevance is because of what happened about a month ago at an intelligence conference in San Antonio.

As Congress debates new rules for government eavesdropping, a top intelligence official says it is time that people in the United States changed their definition of privacy.

Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people's private communications and financial information.

This was one of those inadvertent moments of telling the truth that crop up from time to time in the Bush era (think: "it'd be a lot easier if this was a dictatorship, so long as I'm the dictator.") The goal of the Administration is to eliminate the Fourth Amendment and provide unchecked surveillance powers to the executive in the name of national security, though what those powers would actually be used for is anybody's guess. And the proof for how this debate is completely phony can be seen in today's ruling. The White House has no problem asking 300 million Americans to willingly give up any reasonable expectation of privacy, but zealously guards THEIR OWN, even though the consensus through hundreds of years is that their records must be preserved for history.

It's also completely ridiculous that the White House is claiming that they simply lost those 5 million emails when we know that they have the technology to do this:

The central witness in a California lawsuit against AT&T says the government is vacuuming up billions of e-mails and phone calls as they pass through an AT&T switching station in San Francisco.

Mark Klein, a retired AT&T technician, helped connect a device in 2003 that he says diverted and copied onto a government supercomputer every call, e-mail, and Internet site access on AT&T lines.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which filed the class-action suit, claims there are as many as 20 such sites in the U.S.

At the least, the White House emails are in this system.

This claim that we must give up some privacy for security is maybe the most pernicious of the Bush era, with far-reaching effects for the future of American civil liberties. They are floating this idea that, because we use our credit cards in e-commerce and our real names on Facebook, somehow government spying must be OK. Yet they fail to allow for the most secure possible oversight, through the National Archives, when it comes to their own communications.

"Those two generations younger than we are have a very different idea of what is essential privacy, what they would wish to protect about their lives and affairs. And so, it's not for us to inflict one size fits all," said Kerr, 68. "Protecting anonymity isn't a fight that can be won. Anyone that's typed in their name on Google understands that."

"Our job now is to engage in a productive debate, which focuses on privacy as a component of appropriate levels of security and public safety," Kerr said. "I think all of us have to really take stock of what we already are willing to give up, in terms of anonymity, but (also) what safeguards we want in place to be sure that giving that doesn't empty our bank account or do something equally bad elsewhere."

Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group that defends online free speech, privacy and intellectual property rights, said Kerr's argument ignores both privacy laws and American history.

"Anonymity has been important since the Federalist Papers were written under pseudonyms," Opsahl said. "The government has tremendous power: the police power, the ability to arrest, to detain, to take away rights. Tying together that someone has spoken out on an issue with their identity is a far more dangerous thing if it is the government that is trying to tie it together."

That's why we have to pay attention to what happens in the next 14 months, on all fronts, rather than just hope for better in the future with a new President . The precedents that are being set now will carry over for decades, and we must continue to completely reject these claims of unchecked surveillance coupled with official secrecy.

Why I Now Use Facebook

You knew that when Rupert bought MySpace he wouldn't be content with their umpteen revenue streams and would seek to make bank off of people's profiles.

MySpace, the world's largest social networking site and work procrastination tool, will finally start capitalizing on all that personal information its users have been innocently (or, as is the case with many profile photos, not-so-innocently) putting into their profiles.

The New York Times reports that executives at Fox Interactive Media, the New Corporation unit that owns MySpace, have been tinkering for about six months with technology that can tailor ads to the personal information of its 110 million active users.

The company plans to unveil its "completely new paradigm" of online advertising to investors today.

"We are blessed with a phenomenal amount of information about the likes, dislikes and life's passions of our users," said Peter Levinsohn, president of Fox Interactive Media.

Of course, privacy advocates are miffed that these stated life's passions are being used to sell stuff to the passionate folks who naively entered the information without knowing what it would be used for.

"Miffed"? I'd say a little more. There's not even an opt-out for this that I can see. In Rupert's world we're all supposed to be good little consumers while he gets rich off our likes and dislikes. Some would say that the problem is commidifying these Web 2.0 sites necessarily forces you to break that trust with the user. Of course, MySpace was already raking in $40 million a month before this change. Not buying it. Selling people's personal information to make a buck goes too far. MySpace is kind of yesterday's hangout, anyway.