Consider for a moment: how much of your medical information do you store on your computer? If we exempt your browser’s cache (from that last time you tried self-diagnosis), I’ll bet it’s close to zero. I know there’s nothing on mine.

So what the hell is Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) talking about? In a hearing, the Honorable Mr. Smith said that “in tapping into [P2P networks], [users] expose their own private materials–health information–into the public domain.”

Whaa? It seems Gordie also has a porn fixation:

Smith suggested that “grossly pornographic” files on P2P networks are a “deceptive trade practice which seems to be under the FTC’s jurisdiction.” Under the Federal Trade Commission Act, the agency has power to punish “unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce.”

Smith asked the FTC what actions it was taking to protect “young people from what is clearly deception when it comes under the heading Harry Potter and is clearly pornography.” — News.com

I’m not sure how free P2P networks classify as trade, but that’s okay because the problem solves itself: keep your kids off the computer.

After all, you don’t want them finding your medical records.

That would be Stupid-Ass Republican Staffers, who are dishing out some amusing quotes while playing pattycake with the Dems on the cost of Bush’s Top Gun stunt. It’s pure politics, of course, but I found many of the quotes to be a textbook example of fallacious reasoning. (Quotes come from White House Defends Bush’s Jet Trip to Carrier, an NYT/CNN piece.)

Ok, let’s begin.

“The president wanted to go out somewhere to thank the men and women who made this possible in person,” White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer told reporters Wednesday. “They deserve nothing less. These are the men and women who fought a war to keep us free, to protect us and to save us.”

Translation: Who cares what it cost when it’s about the troops? The TROOPS, I tell you! And freedom! Yes, sweet freedom, like suckling at the warm bosom of Lady Liberty herself. Who’s got a question on freedom? Anybody?

The White House officials said the Navy recommended the jet as the safest mode of travel to the aircraft carrier because it offered the option to eject if the aircraft missed the deck on its approach for landing.

No, wait, I take it back. It’s about safety. Yes, safety — and not just the kind that our brave, true American soldiers brought us by bravely volunteering to protect freedom (did I mention freedom?) — but the safety of our dear, duly-elected leader. True, we didn’t talk about safety for any of the cabinet members who attended, such as Condi Rice. We didn’t really see why comparisons between every other time a president visited an aircraft carrier without using a fighter jet make this stance a contradiction, given that slamming a jet at full thrust onto a short landing strip in the hope that a hook said jet is trailing will snag a line, thus (usually) snapping the jet to a stop, is so doggone safe. None of that is important. But trust me, it’s so safe, you wouldn’t believe it. Much safer than, say, taking a boat the 30 miles to the carrier. Also, ignore those published reports about Dick Cheney suggesting the flight. It was, um, Navy safety experts.

“Bring it on,” said one senior official said of the Democratic criticism. “If they think there is something to be gained by investigating and criticizing the president for going out to welcome the troops home, they are even more ridiculous than I thought.”

Did we mention the troops?

But officials said the cost differences were analyzed and were marginal; one official said the hourly cost of using a helicopter was only slightly less expensive than using a jet. This official also said that in the end, the cost of the jet might actually be lower because it made the trip in less time than a helicopter would have.

I don’t know what that other guy was talking about. Safety? Pshaw! This is about your tax dollars. We looked at all the options and found this the cheapest. And why? I’m glad you asked. You see, I, a White House official, happen to be an expert on the cost of operation for military equipment. I was crunching some numbers and I have decided that faster = cheaper! It’s so logical, isn’t it?

In fact, since every flying machine has the same operating expenses, I can’t understand why airlines don’t service every airport with 747s. It would certainly be cheaper.

Of course, here in the Land of the Brave, we wish it could be free.

Comes now three judges from the U. S. District Court of Columbia to declare (in a record 1,638 page ruling) that portions of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law are unconsitutional.

We’ll have to see what the Supremes think of that ruling. For now, allow me to offer my own plan for campaign finance reform. Its basis is one simple precept: allow donations only from individuals. The move would preclude PACs, SIGs, corporations, unions, associations, and anything else that is non-human from contributing to political campaigns.

To my point of view, this would make the process much more transparent, as open records would allow us to see which person is expecting quid-pro-quo, not just (for example) data about bullshit associations that are fronts for others.

James Carville called Ross Perot’s 1992 presidential campaign “the most expensive act of masturbation in human history.” One wonders if Carville caught G. W. Bush’s performance on the USS Abraham Lincoln tonight.

Was there anything about the event that didn’t seem hopelessly contrived? From the ship to the Friends lead-in, the Pilot Bush clip to the strangely well-timed way the live camera managed to pull back just before a “spontaneous” standing ovation, we had all the markings of a dry-run for a re-election campaign. All that was missing was some of that “crowds“-pulling-down-a-Saddam-statue footage.

Or maybe some weapons of mass destruction. After hearing all along that Iraq was just on the edge of using the weapons we “know for a fact” they have — the evidence of which Colin Powell was sorting through to present to the U.N., the prize that military planners were supposedly preoccupied with (since we know it wasn’t museums or hospitals) — well, all we heard about those was:

We’ve begun the search for hidden chemical and biological weapons, and already know of hundreds of sites that will be investigated.

That roughly translates to: “we already know of some places we should look.” I feel safer already.

I have a few things to say about the Rick Santorum comments, but first I just want to note that this is one of the best lines I’ve read in an AP interview (transcript):

AP: I’m sorry, I didn’t think I was going to talk about “man on dog” with a United States senator, it’s sort of freaking me out.

With Republicans expecting President Bush to roll to re[-]election in 2004, their focus is fast turning to 2008 and whom the GOP will run against expected Democratic nominee Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Now, Whispers is told that Florida Gov. Jeb Bush looks strong. “If Jeb is in the mix” for the nomination, says a top GOP official, “it’s his.”

Oh sweet N.E. Jesus, nooo! From U.S. News (scroll down; it’s just above the piece on Clinton’s donations to needy kids) by way of TMW.

Today is the anniversary of Thomas Jefferson’s birthday; the day the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression announces their “Muzzle” awards, in the process “calling attention to those who in the past year forgot or disregarded Mr. Jefferson’s admonition that freedom of speech ‘cannot be limited without being lost.'”

Read the list. If you find you are in the constituency of a recipient (and I guarantee you are), remember this come election time.

When Gateway wanted to run an ad on the nation’s highest-rated television network, they were turned down flat. The reason: the rather tame commercial‘s accompanying Web site* (theme: “Rip. Burn. Respect.”) features content that contravenes CBS policy against running ads which advocate a position on “any divisive issue,” as the L.A. Times summarizes a spokesperson. Gateway says it’s not the first time CBS has turned them down.

Most reporters note that CBS parent Viacom is a vocal supporter of the Fritz Hollings bill the Gateway site indirectly condemns (“There’s even a bill in the U.S. Senate…”) Another network has agreed to run the ad.

Meanwhile, the English-language site of Arab news network Al-Jazeera is back online after hacking and massive traffic made the server’s content inaccessible in recent days.

The return comes no thanks to Akamai Technologies, the “edge distribution” company whose 13,000 Internet servers help the big boys serve their pages to a wide audience. Akamai cancelled an Al-Jazeera contract, saying only that they “ultimately decided not to continue a customer relationship with Al-Jazeera, and we are not going to be providing them our services.”

By definition, corporations can’t censor. But one old saw seems as true as ever: Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.

* Anyone else think the bad Frutiger 95 kerning has a Star Wars feel?

“An Oregon anti-terrorism bill would jail street-blocking protesters for at least 25 years in a thinly veiled effort to discourage anti-war demonstrations, critics say. … The bill contains automatic sentences of 25 years to life for the crime of terrorism. Critics of the bill say its language is so vague it erodes basic freedoms in the name of fighting terrorism under an extremely broad definition.”
—Oregon Law Would Jail War Protesters as Terrorists

“[S]ome students at Bellingham High School have been taken out of class and sent to the principal’s office for refusing to stand during the Pledge of Allegiance as a way of protesting the war in Iraq.”
—ACLU Concerned With School Pledge Policy

Dissent is as American as it gets. Let’s pledge allegiance to that ideal, and not to some object.

Update [04 Apr]: Holy crap! Let’s not forget A Christian Response to AIDS.

Best we can hope for now is a swift resolution, with a minimal loss of life. And for the sake of fuck, a follow-through.

“Just so you know, we’re ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas.”
–Natalie Maines, lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, to a London concert audience.

“The emotion of the callers telling us about their fathers and sons and brothers who are overseas now and who fought in previous wars was very specific.”
–Jim Jacobs, president of Jacobs Broadcast Group, which includes a station boycotting the Chicks.

Simple concept, but apparently it bears repeating: saying you don’t like the president isn’t saying anything about the military.

The West Wing has spoiled us. Politicians who actually say what they mean? A press secretary who is funny and candid? Yep, this must be television.

Here’s how it works in the real world:

Q. Ari, the President was very clear last week, he wanted a vote in the Security Council: “it’s time for countries to show their cards.” And now today, Secretary Powell says, among the options is to go for a vote, or not to go for a vote. What’s going on here?

Mr. FLEISCHER: Okay, let me try to share or inform you about where things stand in the fluid situation with the diplomacy.

The end is coming into sight, and there are numerous routes to reach that end through the diplomacy the President is pursuing. And the President has said that he seeks a vote, and we seek a vote. There are options, as the Secretary has said. I discussed with you this morning the possibility of the vote coming to a conclusion tomorrow, or it could continue into next week. There are numerous options to achieve in the end the President seeks, which is a diplomatic solution. I cannot predict for you every shape and turn of the road on the way to that end, but this end is coming into sight, and that’s why you’re seeing some levels of flexibility and discussion of options as it comes into sight.

That’s from Thursday’s White House press briefing. Now, allow me to translate.

Q. Ari, the President was very clear last week, he wanted a vote in the Security Council: “it’s time for countries to show their cards.” And now today, Secretary Powell says, among the options is to go for a vote, or not to go for a vote. What’s going on here?

Mr. FLEISCHER: blather blather blather Well, we’re afraid we’ll lose. blather blather blather

More than 100 Nashvillians turned out this afternoon to hit a French car with a sledgehammer in support of America’s troops and to protest French anti-American sentiments.

The “Bash A Peugeot For Peace” event at the Beaman Automotive Group on Broadway was sponsored by WWTN radio talk-show host Steve Gill. All proceeds are going to charities that send supplies to troops overseas and their families, who have remained at home.

The first swing of the hammer was taken by World War II veteran Don McGehee, 79, who “did everything [he] was told to do” in the South Pacific during the war. — “Demonstrators smash Peugeot to show support for U.S. troops,” The Tennessean 28 Feb 03

Couple of points here:

• Disagreement does not consitute “anti-American sentiments.”
• Doesn’t “support of America’s troops” include questioning whether they need to die? And asking our civilian leaders if we need to send troops to war in no way diminishes the honor, skill, and integrity of people in uniform. So what are they supporting?
• This was held at a car dealership? Is this the most depraved promotional stunt ever?

To the BELOVED REPUBLIC under whose equal laws I am made the peer of any man, although denied political equality by my native land, I dedicate this book with an intensity of gratitude and admiration which the native-born citizen can neither feel nor understand.

— Dedication to Andrew Carnegie’s Triumphant Democracy (Scribner’s, 1886)

By chance, I saw the first 90 seconds of a Bill O’Reilly broadcast on 26 Feb. At the start of that show, he said this:

Once the war against Saddam Hussein begins, we expect every American to support our military, and if you can’t do that, just shut up.

Americans, and indeed our foreign allies who actively work against our military once the war is underway, will be considered enemies of the state by me.

Just fair warning to you, Barbra Streisand and others who see the world as you do: I don’t want to demonize anyone, but anyone who hurts this country in a time like this, well, let’s just say you will be spotlighted.

“Talking Points” invites all points of view and believes vigorous debate strengthens the country, but once decisions have been made and lives are on the line, patriotism must be factored in.

This does not give the government carte blanche to do anything, but it does give the government the benefit of the doubt at least until that benefit is proven wrong as it was in Vietnam.

It’s exactly because of this say-nothing-and-fall-in-line attitude put forth by fascists like O’Reilly that the Vietnam war went on for as long as it did. Every use and every deployment of a civilian-led military should always, always be questioned by the people.

Of course, O’Reilly has no monopoly on stupidity. At least the press corps knows how to handle it: watch this RealVideo clip and advance to 30:00.