Gingrich calls for 'Net free-speech clampdown to deter terrorists
By Paul McNamara on Tue, 11/28/06 - 12:29pm.
Former House Speaker and presumptive 2008 Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich addressed a freedom-of-speech awards dinner in New Hampshire last night and said the problem with the Internet in an age of terrorism is that it allows too damn much freedom of speech.
No word in the newspaper coverage as to how his words were received by the "Live Free or Die" state audience.
My guess is the Internet community, to say the very least, won't welcome them.
According to the Manchester Union-Leader: "Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a 'different set of rules' may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message.
"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city," Gingrich said, "which I think could happen in the next decade."
Press reports offered now specifics as what aspects of Internet free speech Gingrich would sacrifice to the fight against terrorism, but my guess would be that the pugnacious pol -- who's actually known for being a bit of a geek -- would not take kindly to sneaky communications methods of the type we've been writing about here and here.
Or maybe we'll have the encryption debate all over again during President Gingrich's first term.
Tough to tell when a headline-hunting pol starts flapping those gums.
(Update: Newt's reviews have not been kind on this one.
PublicEye at CBS News writes: "Regardless of whether a candidate sees the media overall as friend or foe, the one thing you probably don’t want to do is attack the underpinning of its very existence – at least if you’re thinking about running for the presidency."
Keith Olbermann at MSNBC gives him the business … as only Olbermann can these days.
Mark Jeffrey over at Huffington Post has it about right: "Non-negotiable."
I could go on … and on … and on.)
- About Buzzblog
- Archives
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
- May 2007
- April 2007
- March 2007
- February 2007
- January 2007
- December 2006
- November 2006
- October 2006
- September 2006
- August 2006
- July 2006
- June 2006
- May 2006
- April 2006
- March 2006
- February 2006
- January 2006
Sponsored Links
- Efficiency goes up. Costs come down.- Microsoft
- SQL Server Experts: Virtually unstoppable- Microsoft
- Stay informed with custom newsletters from Tech Dispenser- Tech Dispenser
- FREE LCD Console and 16 node central management tool with purchase of any KN4 series IP KVM- ATEN
- Drive down operating expenses and mitigate risk with app centralization - Live May 12.- Juniper Networks
- The Next Generation of Content Security Has Arrived! Learn More!- Websense, Inc.
- Reduce costs by 49%, Increase capacity utilization by 33%. Make the HP LeftHand SAN work for you.- HP LeftHand SAN
- Connexion saves costs with Microsoft & Novell- Novell Microsoft
- Masters of Virtualization and Cloud Computing- Trend Micro
- Hitachi IT Operations Analyzer—30-day free trial- Hitachi Data Systems
-
Network World, Inc
The Leader in Network Knowledge
Newt's speech
You have to be kidding Newt! We already have had enough of the gestapo tactics of this adminstration and the dismantling of many of our freedoms via electronic evesdroping, habeas corpus, etc. Now you want to work on the internet. Let me tell you that the terrorists are not using the public telephones to get their message out and probably not the traditional websites either. They have more complicated private pathways to do their job. This "war of terror" is a canard anyway. We all know that now. A cover for this administrations many incomentancies. How about a little trust and diplomacy. We are seeing now that we are actually going to have to use a little diplomacy now. Lay off our internet!!!
Looks like the terrorists are winning..
With the aid of people like Newt, who are willing to give up our freedoms & rights in response to terrorism, the terrorists are succeeding in bringing down our country.
Giving in to fear instead of standing up to terrorists will only embolden them and give them power.
Fascist Wish List
Newt's anti-Constitution, anti-rights drivel is very scary. We've seen six years of our 3-branch fascist despotism hammer this sort of criminality right into our legal fabric. They've got all the help they need from their co-fascist wing of Democrats. The Democrats have amply demonstrated that Election 2006 results will not change their co-fascist status one iota.
(And for you shill-trolls who still want to argue about our use of the term, 'fascist', to describe the 3-branch Bush-Cheney regime, shut up and go straight to my essay, "Homegrown American Fascism". There are 26 self-evident points of comparison between Hitler Germany, Mussolini Italy, and Bush America in one succinct paragraph.)
What's scary about Newt's anti-free-speech demand is that he and his fascist-thug cronyies have been passing their constitutional criminalities off as politics-as-usual for six years, and the US voters -- about 50 percent of voting-age Americans -- are still letting them get away with it.
You don't play smash-mouth politics with fascists, you lose. Period. We've lost so much now that fascist thugs like Gingrich know in their tiny little minds that they can get away with anything. The American public has proven beyond doubt that they are far too busy, far too historically ignorant, far too politically stupid, and far too greedy to care about what the fascist despotism does.
Every right infringed means more profits and more power to fascist thugs like Gingrich, Pelosi, Scalia, Chertoff, and Howard Dean. All of them butter their bread with constitutional criminalities made to look like politics-as-usual, instead of the violations of law that the butter truly is.
Stephen Neitzke
Direct Democracy League
DD Revival -- The Blog
Newt
The obvious commie from the "Direct Democracy League" doesn't know his hind end from his elbow. That is the problem with liberals, they think all behavior is A-OK, even terrorist behavior. Newt is the smartest and most historically accurate pundit/politician in Washington DC today. He knows more about our nation, the Constitution of the United States (which all liberals like Mr. Nietzke despise because it was written by Christians with the intent to be underpinned by the Word of God 'The Holy Bible'), and what should be done in this world to make it a better place than anyone in Washington or anywhere for that matter. Of course, all liberal media are going to demonize Newt because he is so right (as in correct)of so many things. Newt has the moral courage to say 'hey we cannot let terrorists set up ways of killing us over the internet and protect it with "free speech".' That is typical ACLU, Commie, Democrat, Liberal trash that is actually the #1 enemy of our wonderful country. They are the enemy within!!!!!!!!!!!!
Newt
Whoa, Newt and the Christian mullahs seem to have a post-Bush agenda in mind for us. Good thing Thomas Jefferson is not around today because he would be considered a Christian-bashing pinko. Hey, did you see where the Massachusetts State Police are going to become de facto immigration police? Looks like another step on the road to consolidating a national police force. Kind of like the Geheime Staatspolizei in Nazi Germany. Hey, I'm no wild eyed survivalist. In fact, I'm a registered Republican. I'm just really worried to see the basic freedoms that make America the "shining light of liberty" in the world be systematically reduced in the name of law and order.