Comments on: Senator to propose surveillance of illegal images

Proposal from Sen. John McCain would force Internet providers to report illegal images, even "cartoons."

[R Me]

crappers

Does this mean that I will no longer be able to display my copy of that cute graphic ad by coppertone that shows a hot little honey in a bikini with the bottom being pulled down by a cute little dog so you can see her illegally seductive cheek?

Does this mean I'm going to jail for a framed semi-antique hanging behind my wet-bar?

Its time to abolish our two party system and way of voting in favor of a method that evens the field for independents.

[unknown unknown]

McCain is a real nut job

It's bad enough he wants to make service providers responsible for policing the internet (more than they are now). Now he want to go against the Supreme Court when it comes to cartoons. When the Supreme Court struck down CPPA's (Child Pornograhy Prevention Act) provision outlawing sexually explicit cartoons of minors it said:

"the CPPA prohibits speech that records no crime and creates no victims by its production. Virtual child pornography is not ?intrinsically related? to the sexual abuse of children. While the Government asserts that the images can lead to actual instances of child abuse, the causal link is contingent and indirect. The harm does not necessarily follow from the speech, but depends upon some unquantified potential for subsequent criminal acts. The Government?s argument that these indirect harms are sufficient because, as Ferber acknowledged, child pornography rarely can be valuable speech, see id., at 762, suffers from two flaws. First, Ferber?s judgment about child pornography was based upon how it was made, not on what it communicated. The case reaffirmed that where the speech is neither obscene nor the product of sexual abuse, it does not fall outside the First Amendment?s protection. See id., at 764?765. Second, Ferber did not hold that child pornography is by definition without value. It recognized some works in this category might have significant value, see id., at 761, but relied on virtual images?the very images prohibited by the CPPA?as an alternative and permissible means of expression, id., at 763. Because Ferber relied on the distinction between actual and virtual child pornography as supporting its holding, it provides no support for a statute that eliminates the distinction and makes the alternative mode criminal as well. Pp. 11?13."


ASHCROFT V. FREE SPEECH COALITION (00-795) 535 U.S. 234 (2002)
198 F.3d 1083, affirmed.

[kobe wild]

No one wants this please take it and go away.

The crime being committed here is trying to push a bill like this.
I have lost all respect for you Mr. McCain.

EFF.. I hope your on top of this one this bill is a crime against internet and the public at large.

[justme1960]

Surveillance?

Give me a break. Whatelse do you want to take away from the People? I think its high time we get rid of all the politicians and change our governmental structure. All you idiots keep taking away and never give back anything to the people. Its time to vote you all out!

[GEBERWEIN]

King John's folly

And some raging liberals thought George W was trying to be a king.

I can see where this will lead to the banning of images between medical professionals so they can seek advice or information about patients. Remember, computers DO NOT understand the purpose of the image, just it's there and it's in this little black book therefore it must be wrong. Thus the cyper police (tens of thousands of federal law enforcement agents) will be rumming about to see all the nasty perverted pediatricians computers.

Further, most state porn laws leave it up to the local community to set standards on such matters. Another interesting point is related to teen sex. How about those states where the age of consent and marriage is 14 or 16. Does that mean a husband of 15 with a nude photo of his 14 year old wife is gonna' get out of the slammer when he is 26?
This is beginning to sound like France in it's policing what their people are alloud to think - let alone say in public.

McCain is beginning to sound more like Kerry every day. He keeps these stunts up and he can forget about running for anything again - unless it's for the Canadian Border cuz Mexico won't want him.

[jjohns128]

John McCain errr Big Brother

cant you see McCain is just a puppet for the evangelical right.......cant you just see him thumping his legislation in a stadiumm full of brain washed jealots.......he insulted the right back during the 2000 presidential election, this is his way of making it up to them with internet censorship......this story isnt about child porn, its about censorship.......be very aware of this !

[Arbalest05]

Anything to take their minds off Iraq

McCain is just hoping that he can change the subject from Iraq where he and the Bush Administration think that "stay the course" sounds like a good strategy.

He's running for President in '08 so he's going to be proposing lots of bills like this one.

[cyberscan]

Dakota Fanning Rape Scene allowed?

Is this some kind of double standard? One law for everyone!!!

[bxdanny]

Outrageous and unconstitutional

The Supreme Court has consistently ruled that the only justification for outlawing child pornography (other than that considered "obscene") is that the making of it involves actual harm to actual children. Attempts to ban cartoon "child porn" have been struck down before, and limiting the ban to images on the internet does not legitimize it.

This will surely be stuck down if passed, but if we are to retain any self-respect as a so-called "free nation", it must not be passed in the first place. The fear of "kiddie porn" is clearly being used as a wedge to introduce a technology that would support censorship for any purpose, and it must be nipped in the bud.

The list of laws that have been given the the acronym "SAFE Act" would be funny if it weren't so tragic. Congressional rules ought to ban the use of these acronyms for naming bills, and of naming proposed laws with someone's first name as well.

[alvin_worldtec]

Post Traumatic Shock Syndrone Relapse for John McCain

Senator McCain should check himself back into VA Hospital for Psychiatric and Psychological Evaluation. But again this could be just one of the many tricks the Republican Party wanted to strip civil liberties from the general public. People like you and I. Politicians always say that China, the Gulf States, Middle Eastern Countries and others have no democracy or Freedom of Expression or Speech. Just look what they have done to us with the Patriotic Act and now, with what Senator McCain want to do.

[alphtoo]

Typically absurd

This is patently and typically absurd on the face of it. Suppose someone posts a sketch, drawing or cartoon: who's to say how old that imaginary being might be? How about if someone posts a photo of his 2-year-old daughter with her bottom showing? I'm sure some perv in our government would find this enough of a turn-on to declare it 'child porn'!
I guess filth is different things to different people; to me it's when idiots like McCain get their filthy hands on our Constution and tear it apart one little piece at a time. I'm all for prosecuting child pornographers, but don't make it the ISPs' problem, don't fuss unless you can prove the subject of the image is a minor, and please don't project your personal perversions on the rest of us. We, The People, are not all perverts.

[jqd2007]

Database for Pedophiles in Congress?

Remember Mark Foley? In my free opinion, this is nothing more than a cover for a sick, pornographic database to be enjoyed by all the sexual deviants and pedophiles running Washington. Makes one wonder about McCain.

[qmuser]

technically undoable and legally rediculous?

There is a big technical mess trying to get every ISP to monitor every image that every customer puts on line. Is the government going to cover the cost of every ISP doubling their computing power, and doubling the internet bandwidth to support this? Does the criminal justice department have the servers or band width to let every ISP run these database searches against their database a billion times a day? Someone here is totally clueless about the magnitude of what would be required to comply with such a law, including the massive budget some government agency would need.

There is a lot of legal precedent that the responsibility for illegal actions is upon the one performing those actions. Gun manufacturers aren't charged for murder when someone gets shot. Alcohol bottlers aren't charged for GUIs committed after over-indulging in their product. Auto manufacturers aren't charged for vehicular manslaughter. And there have been recent rulings that ISPs are not liable when their subscribers perform illegal acts.

If the law enforcement agencies want to compare every image on the web to every image in a databasse of theirs, it should be law enforcements responsibility to do this, not the ISPs. If the government doesn't have the resources, they can write a big check to someone that does (i.e. Google).

[alphtoo]

Big check, with whose money?

Yeah, the gubment can always write a big check, they have all the money they want. They'll just take it from the citizens or print more. If anybody else did this it would be extortion and counterfeiting and they'd be put away. We, The People should let the gubment get away with it either!

[Central_office_tech]

Not to mention

This would be like tapping the phone line of everyone in America. Just instead of a phone it is the internet. The Republicans (I am a republican but I refused to be one sided) have pushed through many laws in the last decade to intrude on american freedoms. I have noticed a trend as of late in using exploited children to get certain laws in.

Lets face it, child pornography is a problem on the net. However many writing laws to rid us of this truly awful thing want to rid us of legal porn as well. This bill could later be used to monitor other things. Traffic cameras are now used to monitor crime. Cell phone GPS is used now to track people.

With carnivore I do not even understand why they need the ISPs unless they want to have a private corporation "tap the line" then they can say they (the federal government) isn't doing it.

Besides the way hashes work, you could change the hash just by slightly altering the image. It is impracticable and they must know that.

[ljhere]

Just another brick in the wall toward building a U.S. fascist government.

Just another brick in the wall toward building a U.S. fascist government.

[orbital318]

How do you decide if an image is of a child or an 18 year old consenting ca

How do you determine a cartoon's age? How do you decide if an image is of a child or an 18 year old consenting cartoon? Now you begin to see the absurdity of this.

Or what about the brilliant 19th century artist Egon Sheila, he paints young women masturbating. Will that art now be banned?

What I don't understand is the US's push to regulate the internet, a global economy. I just don't get it.

[Central_office_tech]

Many drafting these bills wanted to make porn illeagal in all respects

Many republicans wanted to outlaw all porn on the net and in real life. They failed, so they backed up and re-grouped. Now they are fighting child porn. As the laws become stronger they can them slowly move into banning now legal porn or any other content they do not like.

[wbolze]

Porn survelliance

Why pound Senator Mc Cain, Senator Chuck Schumer
is shareing the spotlite also. Did you send them an email stating your objection to invasion of privacy and the stiff penalties.

WEB

[SpiritMatter]

Left and right wing Big Brother sexophobes gone wild!

These people don?t have any real love and concern for children. If they did, they would apply their time and resources towards those abuses that are hurting and killing the most children----poverty, child labor and physical abuse. They don?t really care about dealing with real sexual abuse because it affects all age groups not just children. They don?t seem to understand the difference between healthy sexual play and sexual abuse. Like most sexophobic people on the left and right, they seem to think that any sexual activity, that does not take place between a married man and women solely for the purpose of reproduction, must involve a predator and a victim!
They continue to make the same mistake that the real or mythical Adam and Eve made when, after eating the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, they decided that the nudity God allowed was really shameful and a sin. Shame on God! The concept of shame of sexual parts of the human body and healthy sexual play, did not come from God! These people need to get off their Big Brother hobby horse and start doing their job of protecting the responsible freedom, liberty and tolerance of diverse religious morals, that they supposedly have fought for and are fighting for in Iraq!

[poorgarby]

Good to hear from a grownup on this subject!

SpiritMatter, you are very wise. Censorship of the internet is a very easy (and like most easy ways totally ineffectual) action to take in the name of children's safety. I'm glad that someone is not afraid of being thought a predator when they speak out against this nonsense and call it what it is--sexophobia. Meanwhile, my respect for McCain began to wane seriously when he caved in to the Xian-right and Jerry Falwell (who, let's face it wouldn't know Jesus Christ if he were giving him a ******* in a public men's room!)

[angle.sky]

I LOVE YOU Senator McCain

You are putting light were there is darkness...(concerning children).. When your doing the will of God, you will have much opposition, when your doing the right thing. Thats how you know your on the right path. CONGRADULATIONS)

[ralfthedog]

Good intentions.

I am sure that McCain had good intentions. I support his goals of getting rid of child porn. The problem is the actions that he is outlining will not have a positive effect on the problem.

Other better solutions exist. The truly sad thing about this is that all this talk is probably causing a larger market for this trash and causing more kids to be molested.

In the long run the people who are into child porn need to understand that sooner or later they will be caught.

[kbd05]

How about parents simply...

...watch their kids and keep them off the darn computer? Hmm? Why does the gov't need to do the job that parents should be doing?

The GOP is the new Democratic Party.

[TennMom1]

Say what?

I do not make it a habit to judge one's grammar and spelling. However, your's is so atrocious that I had to read your comment 3 times to understand what YOU'RE saying.

John McCain is not putting light WHERE there is darkness. He is positioning himself as the "Christian" candidate for the 2008 presidential race. For that, he deserves no CONGRATULATIONS.

[Mark Greene]

Congressmen should have reduced rights

while on official business.

I mean, they're job is representation, no?

Wouldn't it be useful if we could surveil them to ensure all of
their official actions--not just those in the chamber--are in the
interest of their constituents?

I mean, if they've got nothing to hide and they're holding a
public, representative office...

Now that would be eaves-dropping I could support.

[Mark Greene]

JUST throwing a bone to the Christian-right before '08

That's all.

Last I heard child pornography and related problems have been on
the decline for years.

But, it continues to be a hot-button issue for the Republican base.

It doesn't matter if it passes or not. the introduction is enough to
score points.

[extinctone]

"Last I heard..."?

"Last I heard child pornography and related problems have been on the decline for years."

You are a damned liar.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/01/12/net_blamed_for_massive_increase/

http://society.guardian.co.uk/children/story/0,,1121332,00.html

http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/chpornography/