Moving Forward on HR 1606
By krempasky Posted in FEC — Comments (48) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Update [2005-11-4 6:58:36 by krempasky]: - Folks, we need to get these members on the record - take some time today and get on the phone and get them to send you a statement on WHY they voted against HR1606 - it's the most important thing you can do to help pass the bill under regular order.
Make no mistake - the Democrats killed The Online Freedom Of Speech Act last night. At the same time, we did get a majority in favor of the bill, but since it was brought under special rules - it needed 2/3rds to pass.
Where do we go from here? Well - the first thing we need to do is pay close attention to the Republicans who voted against the bill. We need to do some more education. Let me say - some of these members may have voted against HR 1606 because of the procedure that brought it to the floor. Others may well have been swayed by the patently dishonest arguments from folks like Democracy21 and the Campaign Legal Center. Some may well have believed that HR 1606 was going to open the gates of soft money once again. That's not true. That's not true. That's not true.
So over the next week - here's what I ask: pick a few representatives from the list below. Contact them and ask them why they voted no. Post their responses in this thread. From there, we can go about the business of educating our people on this issue.
(Of greatest concern to me - what the heck happened to Ohio?)
« Financing the General Election — Comments (6) | Attn: Congressmen - HR 1606 support in the blogosphere — Comments (3) »
Moving Forward on HR 1606 48 Comments (0 topical, 48 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
FYI-
Just contacted his offices..no comment was the responce when asked about his vote.
I was assured I would get a call back as soon as information is availalble.
Think I'll go golf.
He's calling me back with a comment. I reminded him about the Congresswoman's comments to me and asked him to make sure her response on HR 1606 squared with that. Stay tuned.
I'll make a point to contact the NJ reps and see what they have to say...which I'm sure will be more than enlightening if I can even speak to them.
And they did not have a statement yet.
Of reasons to go golf. He's a hard pro-abort (100% NARAL rating), bad on stem cells, bad on marriage, weak on taxes...
agreed..but, he has amazing support in our area.
He had the loyal support of McClory's voters, played the serviceman role well, and is all over the public up here.
Interesting to see how long it takes for my reply....
And sent an email. Waiting for response.
I just went through the blog and emailed him as well. He is a classic socially liberal, middle of the road traditional type, which is pretty much what he has to be to win in this district.
I've seen his name on various democrat target lists, and that's expected since he'll always be a 50-55% majority winner here, or a little more as he builds incumbency expectations.
Also, keep in mind his two neighboring congresspersons directly to the south of here - Schakowsky and Emmanual - so he is right at the edge of some hard leftists.
Still - doesn't explain his vote on this. It will be interesting if he puts out much of a statement.
Pending her comments, it looks like we just need to work hard at a primary challenge in OH-02
LF..up North. Curious to hear what comes out of Kirks office
I am on this big time......We'll see what kind of answers we get, I think I already know....
The two anti-gunners also are against the first amendment. Upton's safe, but Schwarz can get primaried out. He won in 04 with about 25% in the primary since the conservative vote split six ways. 3rd parties got about 8-10% of the vote as well in the general.
Tim Walberg may take Schwarz on again in 06.
I've had a call into Frank Wolf's press secretary, and he's now looking into it. One week after being invited by the House Republican leadership to live blog in the Capitol, it really sucks when your own Congressman votes against this resolution.
In the Philadelphia Inquirer article on HR 1606, Mike Krampasky gets in a quote:
"When government officials that don't understand technology try to write laws that govern technology, it very rarely works well," said Mike Krempasky, the director of redstate.org, a conservative blog.
Raising RS awareness and fighting for freedom of speech-well done.
Why are the dems trying to kill this? I was under the impression (maybe false) that even the dkos crowd supported The Online Freedom Of Speech Act. The devil must be in the details.
Markos (Kos founder) doesn't like the reasoning of the "nay" vote by many in the Dem House leadership.
The 2 main reasons for the opposition were a procedural and substantive one.
The procedural reason because of was the type of vote because it has limited debate (like 30 minutes per side) and allows no room for amendments
The substantive reason has to do with those desired amendments because the bill, as is, raises fears of soft money circumventing campaign limits.
The devil is in the details, as usual.
Go to Kos and read it. it's still on the front page, just scroll down.
I learned more about this bill there than here because of the fact that many Dems voted no when first appearances would have inclined many Kossacks to want a yes. Therefore more efffort is taken to understand the subtlties of what was going on.
All indications point to this bill coming back in as a regular bill with more debate, a 51% majority
and room for amendenments on certain details.
Still - doesn't explain his vote on this. It will be interesting if he puts out much of a statement.
He's an incumbent, isn't he? Rules hostile to the first ammendment's protection of speech, especially political speech, are often adored by people currently in office.
If not, I'll call too.
He's in his 2d term now, after taking over for a long timer. Northern Illinois is full of the long-serving, or formerly long-serving (Hyde, Hastert, Crane). Crane was finally toppled by a young democrat while Kirk continued in a R district. It's fairly split, so he's fairly - insert your adjective - progressive/liberal/moderate/centrist.
I don't think he's anywhere near the status of caring about incumbent protection - if anything, this area is probably ripe for redistricting away one R seat.
Curiously. Kirk and Rahm Emmanuel were high school classmates, same year, and now serve adjoining districts. Different outlooks nationally, but locally they sponsor joint common projects and so forth. It seems Illinois can be weirdly non-partisan on some things, yet still have high ranking folks on both parties extremes.
Two liberal Senators, Liberal Govenor, currupt Liberal Mayor being challenged Jessie Jackson Jr. Dems control both houses of state legislature. Twice as many murders as New York. Ranked 4rth least freindly for bussiness. 9.75% sales tax. Roads suck. Have to get a permitt to pick your nose. Bears usually suck, Cubs usually suck, Bulls suck, Blackhawks suck, Northwestern sucks, Depaul sucks but hey how bout them White Soxs
P.S. Winter starts next week
a RINO. I vote against him at every opportunity, but he keeps getting sent back with huge percentages.
But he loves to spend money, and I am not surprised at all to see his name on this list.
Congressman Platts' Statement on Soft Money and the Internet (H.R. 1606)
I strongly support free speech on the Internet, just as I do on the airwaves and in the public square. Blogs and other Internet communications are an exciting and growing aspect of our democratic system. They provide a forum for debate and a low-cost means of promoting candidates and ideas. At the same time, without the application of any campaign finance restrictions to the Internet (as proposed by H.R. 1606), corporations and unions could improperly funnel undisclosed contributions of exceedingly large sums to parties and candidates in the form of on-line political advertisements.
As the last election cycle demonstrated, the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act has been successful in reducing the role of large, undisclosed "soft money" contributions to political parties and candidates without diminishing free speech in any way. As such, I voted against H.R. 1606, which would have undermined the 2002 law by creating a new, potentially huge soft money loophole.
The Federal Elections Commission (FEC) is currently drafting regulations aimed at protecting the free speech rights of bloggers and others using the Internet, while also maintaining the requirement that only "hard money" be used by political parties, corporations, and unions for paid election ads. I believe the development of these regulations should be allowed to proceed. In addition, Representatives Chris Shays and Martin Meehan have introduced legislation (H.R. 4194) which would protect the free speech rights of bloggers without creating a soft money loophole. The House should consider this or similar legislation as an alternative to H.R. 1606.
"I voted against H.R. 1606, the 'Online Freedom of Speech Act' because the courts have ordered the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to draw up regulations on possible restrictions to online political discourse, which the FEC is expected to do within the next two months. I thought it was premature for Congress to meddle into the regulatory process at this time. Let the FEC do the job for which it has been established. Congress can always revisit the issue at a later time if necessary.
I am also worried about the potential soft-money campaign loopholes that could exist without some sort of regulation in this area. Only time will tell us if that turns out to be true. Let the FEC do its job first. This legislation is premature and not needed at this time."
Nebraska's 3rd District representative... no comment so far. Will keep on them here. One wonders if he even read the thing from the silence I'm getting.
... or face the purple wrath! And yeah, the permit thing is so bad that it skips maddening and goes straight to completely hilarious.
The Illinois political parties bear little resemblance to their national counterparts. Just look at Kirk, Daley, Keyes, the Ryans, Blagojevich . . . IMO, not too similar to what you'd expect out of their respective allegiances. It might be due to the influence of the Chicago political machine.
Then again, we do have Jesse Jackson, Jr.
yesterday poor little Kos put down his GW Bush voodoo doll,set aside his strategy for control of the Democratic Party[ is he a psychiatrist ?] and wept bitter tears on his bib because he had been sold out by Common Cause and other allies in the asylum charitably known as the left. They told cutsey little him one thing and did exactly the opposite, who would have guessed?? Just a passing comment on dementia and deceit and the tribal loyalty and principles of those who would protect our most precious freedom.
Is that the roads suck but they're constantly being torn up and "improved." That's some trick, I've gotta hand it to them.
I guess since none of my Texas Republicans are on the list, I should be proud of them on this one. :-)
After watching them all waffle on Social Security Reform and Tom DeLay helping Dubya rack up major spending increases (like Medicare Rx) it's nice to be proud of them for something again. :-)
Emerson's offices in Rolla and D.C. don't have any idea how she voted, why she voted or even that the vote existed. Obviously it wasn't a big concern for her. I will update if they get back to me (which I don't expect.)
Why can't these people's "representatives" keep their noses out of everyone's arses!? They keep meddling, tinkering, and ruining every thing they touch!
No answer to messages, so I called Rep. Osborne's DC office today. They acted as if they'd never heard of the bill. Looks like they're only sending answers by mail.
Too bad the Representative decided to run for Governor of Nebraska - he's going to have to do a hell of a lot better than this "I'll get back to you next week" duck & hiding on issues and having uninformed staff members. I've spoken with his Governor opposition staff and they're excited about presenting Osborne as voting with Pelosi, Rangel, etc.
Sincerely,
THE Ohio State University Buckeyes
You are better off calling her Cape Girardeau office, which is her main district one. Her Rolla office is 1 person.
It might do new Congresswoman Schmidt some good to start talking to some of the members of the Republican Study Committee about what it really means to be an advocate of free speech. I noteced from their website http://johnshadegg.house.gov/rsc/ that she is not a member. Maybe she just hasn't had time to join yet.
I have run into the preverbial "Stone Wall". Not one single comment from anyone I contacted, zero, zip, nada.
Being a former Cape Girardean (actually, Jacksonian), I was able to use my parents' address to get a comment in on the constituent section of her website.
I expect no response soon.
Stay classy, RedState.
When it's all said and done, you wake up and you're still from Ohio.
Nuff said, good luck.
The link above to "Rob Simmons, CT" appears to be
messed up.
http://www.house.gov/formsimmons/ima/send_email.html
might work better, but you have to fill out a form (or two) first. Then you will not get a reply, according to the site, unless you live in the 2nd cong. district.
Sorry Mike, since I live in Chris Shay's district (he prefers e-mail to posted mail, BTW), I gave up.
And, apparently, she lies about it.