Day: September 14, 2023

You Can’t Wish Away The 1st Amendment To Mandate Age Verification

Ms. Cat

So, we’ve been talking a lot about age verification of late, as governments around the world have all (with the exception of Australia?!?) seemed to settle on that as a solution to “the problem” of the internet (exactly what that problem is they cannot quite identify, but they’re pretty sure there is one). Of course, as we’ve explained time and time again, age verification creates all sorts of problems, including undermining both privacy and speech rights.

You Can’t Wish Away The 1st Amendment To Mandate Age Verification

Related:

Ban Online Porn for Kids

The Moral Panic Over Internet Porn Can’t Overrule the First Amendment

Matt Taibbi Flashback (9/11): CNN Sentences Palestine To Death

Ms. Cat

There was a candlelight vigil in East Jerusalem on the night of the 9/11 attacks, Yassir Arafat gave blood, schoolchildren around the country took part in moments of silence…

Instead, the media showed the same 30-second clip over and over… The obvious agenda was to rally its viewers around the very crudest response to the news: violence needed to be met with more violence and a political clampdown…

Probably no single film clip in recent history has had as much of an impact as the Palestine clip. Summing it up was Ehud Sprinzak, an Israeli expert on terrorism, quoted in Reuters referring to the clip: “From the perspective of Jews, it is the most important public relations act ever committed in our favor.”

Three additional reports below (two from German media):

By Matt Taibbi, reposted from eXile, September 20, 2001 [photos below added by IAK]

Matt Taibbi Flashback (9/11): CNN Sentences Palestine To Death

DHS Awards $20 Million To Program That Flags Americans As Potential “Extremists” For Their Online Speech

Ms. Cat

An overt way of policing speech?

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has awarded 34 grants to as many organizations, worth a total of $20 million, whose role will be to undergo training in order to flag potential online “extremist” speech of Americans.

DHS Awards $20 Million To Program That Flags Americans As Potential “Extremists” For Their Online Speech

Hype on iPhone ‘ban’ shows US has a guilty conscience

Ms. Cat

The biggest destroyer of the global economic and trade order is being paranoid. This is perhaps the most incisive and vivid explanation of why the US government and media outlets have seen a rumored ban on iPhones as China’s retaliation against the US.

Hype on iPhone ‘ban’ shows US has a guilty conscience

Related:

US spokesman behind on the news pours gas on seemingly settled China iPhone ban

In what appears to be a statement generated before news of the Chinese government refuting ban rumors, the White House chimed in on the matter, as reported by Bloomberg. The National Security Council shared that it is watching the issue with concern.