Welcome to the "Screw the FEC Online Magazine"

Yeah, right.

Captain Ed over at Captain's Quarters boldly declares "This Is A Blog. This Will Remain A Blog."

Hear hear!

The Screw the FEC BLOG will not change one iota based on the latest FEC BS.

Check out my other BLOG -- The Art of the BLOG -- for more.

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Cross-posted at the The Art of the BLOG.

Brad Smith Leaves the FEC

Mr. Smith Leaves Washington

The first amendment took a big hit on Wednesday when Bradley Smith resigned as member of the Federal Election Commission. Mr. Smith was arguably the biggest hawk for protecting political speech in the history of the commission, which regulates political and campaign activities. He made all sorts of enemies, especially among liberal activists who believe that the right to free speech doesn't include the right to spend money promoting your views.

It speaks volumes that arguably the happiest person in America to see him go is Senator John McCain. Mr. McCain is on a mission to regulate away virtually all private political spending. Ever since he was caught in an embarrassing financial relationship with a disgraced savings & loan owner, he's adopted the view that political giving is inherently corrupt and corrupting.

This is not a good time for Mr. Smith to be leaving. Several monumentally important First Amendment issues will be decided in the new few years, including regulation of Internet political activities. Mr. McCain also wants to ban the independent spending of "527" groups, which was a direct outgrowth of his previous effort to ban large contributions to the political parties. Mr. Smith told me recently: "The right to political free speech in America has pretty much reached the end of its tethers." Even the usual defenders of civil liberties, he added, had abandoned their principles because "their hostility to money overrides their concern about the First Amendment."

President Bush will now have two crucial new appointments to make on the six-member commission, and there's widespread fear among conservative leaders that the President will defer to the wishes of Mr. McCain. Some Republicans believe since their party can raise more "hard-dollar" donations than Democrats can, outlawing soft-dollar 527 groups and gagging deep-pocketed liberals like George Soros would play to the GOP's advantage. Maybe so. But putting McCainiacs on the FEC would be tantamount to strapping the Bill of Rights to a block of concrete and tossing it into the ocean. Brad Smith wasn't popular on the FEC because he unfailingly put principle ahead of politics. Mr. Bush would be doing the Constitution a big favor if he named two more nominees just like him to the commission.

-- Stephen Moore

From Opinionjournal.com's Political Diary. Go there and subscribe.

(Full disclosure: STFEC has no affiliation with Opinionjournal.com or Political Diary. It's just a darn good read and will help you keep up on the inner political ideas of the times.)

Cross-posted at The Art of the Blog

The Electronic Frontier Foundation

(via MyPetJawa via NIF)

The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) has a page specifically about bloggers and how to help ensure your freedom including their Legal Guide for Bloggers.

Go check it out.

Bloggers can be journalists (and journalists can be bloggers) - We're battling for legal and institutional recognition that if you engage in journalism, you're a journalist, with all of the attendant rights, privileges, and protections. (See Apple v. Does.)

Bloggers are entitled to free speech - We're working to shield you from frivolous or abusive threats and lawsuits. Internet bullies shouldn't use copyright, libel, or other claims to chill your legitimate speech. (See OPG v. Diebold.)

Bloggers have the right to political speech - We're working with a number of other public-interest organizations to ensure that the Federal Election Commission (FEC) doesn't gag bloggers' election-related speech. We argue that the FEC should adopt a presumption against the regulation of election-related speech by individuals on the Internet, and interpret the existing media exemption to apply to online media outlets that provide news reporting and commentary regarding an election -- including blogs. (See our joint comments to the FEC; [PDF, 332K].)

Bloggers have the right to stay anonymous - We're continuing our battle to protect and preserve your constitutional right to anonymous speech online, including providing a guide to help you with strategies for keeping your identity private when you blog. (See How to Blog Safely (About Work or Anything Else).)

Bloggers have freedom from liability for hosting speech the same way other web hosts do - We're working to strengthen Section 230 liability protections under the Communications Decency Act (CDA) while spreading the word that bloggers are entitled to them. (See Barrett v. Rosenthal.)

[All links in original.]

Cross-posted at The Art of the Blog.

Brad Smith, the FEC, and the Internet

Michelle Malkin brings us the latest on Brad Smith over at the FEC plus a great retrospective list of her posts about the FEC and blogging.

Cross-posted at The Art of the Blog.

The FEC and Free Speech

QandO.net looks at the effects of free speech regulation over at the FEC.

Regulation is never a one-time deal. It always grows. Look at any incidence of Federal Regulation, and the common thread is that regulation grows ever more burdensome.

Cross posted at The Art of the Blog.

FEC and Blogging Round-Up 06-11-05

Mark Alexander: Campaign Finance Reform: The law of unintended consequences?

Under the law, which the FEC will have to enforce if Congress does not intervene, even a link to a candidate's website will be considered a political contribution. While the value of such a "contribution" remains uncertain, Bradley Smith, one of the FEC's three Republican commissioners, warns that FEC regulatory precedents don't bode well for the blogosphere. "Corporations aren't allowed to donate to campaigns," notes Smith. "Suppose a corporation devotes 20 minutes of a secretary's time and $30 in postage to sending out letters for an executive. As a result, the campaign raises $35,000. Do we value the violation on the amount of corporate resources actually spent, maybe $40, or the $35,000 actually raised? The commission has usually taken the view that we value it by the amount raised. It's still going to be difficult to value the link, but the value of the link will go up very quickly."

Sound bad? That's not all, warns Smith. "The judge's decision is in no way limited to ads. She says that any coordinated activity over the Internet would need to be regulated, as a minimum. The problem with coordinated activity over the Internet is that it will strike, as a minimum, Internet reporting services."

Under current law, however, "press exemption" is limited to a "broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine or other periodical publication." This would bring the status of Internet-based publications -- such as The Federalist Patriot -- into serious question. So warns Commissioner Smith: "[Internet reporting services are] exempt from regulation only because of the press exemption. But people have been arguing that the Internet doesn't fit under the press exemption. It becomes a really complex issue that would strike deep into the heart of the Internet and the bloggers who are writing out there today." . . .

This week's "Alpha Jackass" award:

"Some will argue that the First Amendment of the Constitution renders unlawful any restrictions on the right of anyone to raise unlimited amounts of money for political campaigns. Mr. President, which drafter of the Constitution believed or anticipated that the First Amendment would be exercised in political campaigns by the relatively few at the expense of the many?" --John McCain, March 2001

The big lie...

"To permit an entire class of political communications to be completely unregulated irrespective of the level of coordination between the communication's publisher and a political party or federal candidate, would permit an evasion of campaign finance laws." --U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ruling on the regulation of the Internet, ordering the FEC to revise its rules

RedState.org explains that blogging at the office may be against the law if the FEC has its way.

Finally, an article from last week about Blogs Face Possible FEC Regulation.

"No one is talking about limiting speech or spending, just disclosure, and I think that it is very valuable for voters to know if campaigns are behind a blog," said Hasen. "If you are reading something that said John Thune is a great senator, you might react differently if you knew John Thune paid for it.

Riiiiight. Sure that's all. And I'm the Easter Bunny.

China's FEC

Apparently, China has its own FEC.

China Orders All Blogs to Register

Authorities have ordered all China-based Web sites and blogs to register or be closed down, in the latest effort by the communist government to police the world of cyberspace.

An Open Letter to the Federal Election Commission

Prying1 has a great open letter to the FEC about Free Speech Rights.

I think we should all make the pledge at given at the end of this letter: We Will Not Obey These Rules as Restrictions on Our Free Speech.

I did it back in March. Leave a comment and link to your post joining the cause.

An Open Letter to the Federal Election Commission

To the Commissioners of the Federal Election Commission:

One of the most basic founding principles of this country was and is the right of free political speech. This possible attempt to regulate the blogs is flies directly in the face of that principle.

Consider this; The blogosphere is the electronic equivalent of the Town Square. Bloggers are those people, that in a bygone era would be upon a soap box in that town square, expressing their political beliefs. That being said, the government should no more attempt to regulate the free political speech of the bloggers, then it would have attempted to silence the citizen on that very soap box in the town square.

Having read some of the reasoning for this hearing, I have to wonder if the FEC will soon be trying to attempt to assess the worth of the campaign volunteer, who goes door-to-door handing out a candidates literature or spends time manning the phone banks. How much is a volunteer's time worth to any campaign? The FEC would not even consider assessing that volunteer's time as a campaign contribution. So why would the FEC even consider trying to assess the value of a bloggers link to a candidate's web site as a campaign contribution?

Any attempt by the FEC to regulate the political speech of any blogger is clearly a violation of the First Amendment and not at all what campaign finance reform was attempting to do.

Clearly, McCain-Feingold, was never intended to include the regulation of the free political speech of bloggers. Senators McCain and Feingold are both on the record saying this. As I see it, the Commissioners have a few paths they can go down:

1) They can table this and await legislation from the Congress clarifying the status of the blogs.
2) They can appeal the court's decision, which I believe they should have done in the first place.
3) They can extend the press exemption to the blogs.
4) They can release a firestorm and put in place rules unconstitutionally regulating the rights of free speech of bloggers.

In conclusion, let me say this, if the FEC makes rules that limit my First Amendment right to express my opinion on core political issues, I will not obey those rules.

Center for Democracy & Technology FEC Page

The Center for Democracy & Technology has some great resources to learn about the FEC's proposed rules and a petition to help inform the FEC f your thoughts. Please take a moment to go fill out the form now.

They have been added to the sidebar.

Write the FEC NOW!

(via Instapundit)

You still have time to submit a comment to the FEC on their proposed free speech takeover.

The FEC has proposed to apply campaign finance rules to online speech. The FEC comment period ends tonight.

The proposed rule regulates what you can say on personal web pages and blogs, what advertisements you can carry (whether or not you control the ads), what sites you can link to, and many other common activities.

The Center for Democracy and Technology has a page on the subject, a brief survey about online speech, and a statement of principles which you can sign.

If this matters to you, please consider signing CDT's statement of principles.

The above was lifted directly from Faisal N. Jawdat. Please take a moment to visit that site for providing these wonderful links.

Message from the Center for Individual Freedom

link

To: Interested Parties
From: Reid Cox, General Counsel, Center for Individual Freedom
Re: FEC Proposed Internet Rules

This Friday is the deadline for submitting comments about the Federal Election Commission's draft rules for regulating political communications on the Internet.

As a long-time leader in the fight against increased government regulation of free speech, the Center for Individual Freedom will file comments criticizing the FEC's proposed rules.

I thought you would be interested in a preview of the Center's position.

Generally, despite what's been reported in the MSM, these rules pose serious concerns for bloggers and others who use the Internet to publish news or their own comments on political matters.

The Internet is one of the last few arenas for pure, unregulated, unfiltered speech. It is as close as we can come in our modern society and culture to pronouncing our views from a soapbox on a street corner. These rules represent the government's first foray into regulating online content. And once the government begins to regulate something, it is certain that the regulation will only become more aggressive, wide-reaching and restrictive over time. Even if you accept the FEC's assertion that the proposed rules will not interfere with bloggers or other Internet content providers (which we do not), there is no guarantee that the FEC or court will not use these rules in the future as a precedent or jumping off point for a much broader regulatory regime in the future. Indeed, based on past experiences, it's almost certain that someone will do just that.

In addition, with these rules, the FEC is trying to regulate a medium that by its very nature is beyond regulation. The Internet is constantly evolving. Who could have foreseen five years ago that RSS feeds, Moveable Type and other technologies would transform Americans' ability to announce their views publicly. No one can imagine what the next generation of speech might look like. The FEC's attempt to regulate the Internet can only end in a patchwork of rules sure to applied haphazardly and unfairly. Some web-publishers will be subject to the rules. Others won't. But, come election time, everyone will need a lawyer to figure out what they can say and when they can say it.

Most importantly, the FEC's rules make an even bigger hash of the so-called media exemption. (The exemption provides that media publishers won't be subject to the speech, content and disclosure regulations in the current campaign finance laws and regulations.) Sure, the FEC concedes that such mainstream web-publication as Slate and Salon will now receive the media exemption. But that conclusion is about five years behind the times. Countless other websites, many with a "staff" of one, are reporting and publishing news and opinion via the web. It's time for the FEC to recognize this fact and extend the media exemption to a much wider universe of publishers, including bloggers and other web-based media.

The Center's submission will also address some of the countless other specific problems in the proposed rules.

At this stage, however, we believe it is critical that bloggers and other web publishers begin to once again raise awareness of the proposed rules and make their own voices heard.

If you'd like, please feel free to post or reproduce all or part of this message.

If you'd like to submit your own comments on the proposed rules to the FEC, you can e-mail them to internet@fec.gov. All comments must be submitted by June 3. One important note: comments to the FEC will only be considered if they include the full name and full address of the person submitting the comments.

Our Champion v. the FEC

Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev) is leading the fight to exempt the internet in general from FEC regulations.

Now I do not doubt that he is doing so in his own interest (in NEVER doubt that about ANY pol) . . but he is still the leading proponent to keep our freedoms intact.

Send your Senators and Reps an email explaining to them that they should support Senator Reid in this effort.

• Email George Bush
  
• Email Your Senators
  
• Email Your Reps

FEC Proposed Rules

The FEC has put out a PDF with proposed rules.

Most of it has to do with restricting the actions of blogs paid to blog by the candidates or their parties. This I have no problem with.

But they say, in weak wording, that they are not going to go after individual blogs.

The Commission notes that the proposed change to the definition of ‘‘public communication’’ would not affect content placed by an individual on his or her own Web site, blog, or email. Because republishing campaign materials on one’s own Web site, blog, or e-mail would not be a public communication, it would not be a contribution to the candidate under 11 CFR 109.21. The Commission notes that

Senator Russ Feingold, one of BCRA’s sponsors, stated recently that ‘‘linking campaign Web sites, quoting from, or republishing campaign materials and even providing a link for donations to a candidate, if done without compensation, should not cause a blogger to be deemed to have made a contribution to a campaign or trigger
reporting requirements.’’24 Should the Commission amend 11 CFR 109.21(c)(2 to exempt all dissemination, distribution, or republication of campaign materials on the Internet generally, or keep the reference in the regulation to ‘‘public communication’’?

note that the italicized part is a question and not a statement.

In other words, they are not sure that they should leave private blogs alone if those blogs republish things from campaign sites or that favor one candidate.

Beware the gov't functionary who sounds "vaguely reasonable" yet leaves such wiggle room in his statements.

And So It Begins . . .

The FEC is about to start Screwing with the Blogosphere and telling us what our First Amendment Rights don't include.

Web loggers, who pride themselves on freewheeling political activism, might face new federal rules on candidate endorsements, online fundraising and political ads, though bloggers who don't take money from political groups would not be affected.

I say we fight back!

Join me by sending me an email and let's make this a group blog which posts and comments on all things FEC v. The Blogosphere related.

Send me an email with your information and a link to your blog and we can talk about your becoming a co-author* on SCREW THE FEC!

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*I don't care if you are Left, Right, or Middle so long as you are conscientious, polite, and link to your sources. "Screw the FEC" should be the most offensive wording on the site.