Of all pressing issues facing America, it's absolutely ridiculous for congress to be so steadfastly ignorant in their support in such overreaching laws as the "Stop Online Piracy Act" and the "Protect Intellectual Property Act." It's not entirely surprising noting the strong relationship between Hollywood and the government, especially with Barack Obama as president and Chris Dodd's new job as a Hollywood lobbyist. To appease Hollywood, powerful legislators, with majority support from the Democratic Party, attempted to introduce and eventually pass both legislation. However, thankfully, the indignation of the public and the intelligence and passion of our generation rose up to defeat both acts.
SOPA and PIPA ultimately attempt to further combat online piracy by providing even more power to intellectual property holders and the government. It also allows IP holders, as if a vigilante police force, to shut down websites, essentially blacklisting them, as well as to force closure of financial accounts. All of this is done with minimal-at-best due process. While the laws themselves won't create some sort of Orwellian society, it basically says that any misuse of intellectual property is cause for "removing" a website. If you truly understand the Internet you'd understand that the entire internet culture, especially the humor, is entirely dependent on humorous uses of what is ultimately protected material in some way. But the real issue at heart with this legislation is the fact that these bills were completely unnecessary and delegated far too much power to elite special interests, the government being its own special interest when power is involved as well.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which passed unanimously in 1998, already gave IP holders a clear legal right to use judicial means to stop misuse of intellectual property. If you watch the Daily Show or Colbert Report, I'm sure you've encountered a "takedown notice" trying to look up clips on YouTube. Passing SOPA and PIPA would not have gotten rid of piracy-driven sites like The Pirate Bay, and it most certainly wouldn't have stopped piracy havens in countries with no copyright laws; and yet our own government was ready to pass these bills. Republican hypocrites would further empower the Obama government they claim they want to shrink while plotting the next war. While Democratic hypocrites rallied over Bush's massacre of the constitution, some supported SOPA and PIPA. These empty politicians seem to inherently believe the solution to almost every problem is to expand the power of the government while demonstrating every reason why the elite levels of government should have less power.
This isn't just a problem at one level of government either. The recent declaration of what amounts to making protesters pay to protest at the state capitol is so shockingly unabashed in its censorship that it makes me sad Wisconsin has come to this. Our rights are slowly slipping away as ignorant politicians grapple with each other over the same power struggles they've engaged in time and time again. This is the real problem, at the top of both state and federal governments. Whether it is Democrats at the federal level or Republicans at the state level, they're all advancing the same problem. There are still people who really believe in public service, but the level of public scrutiny needs to drastically increase to combat the forces, whether intentional or consequential, that are diminishing freedom and needlessly increasing government power. That brings me to the most worrisome expansion of government power that we have seen since Obama was elected. Something that resembles more of the year 2001 than the year 2011.
The 2012 National Defense Authorization Act contains provisions within it that should shock and disgust anyone who treasures the freedom we have in this country. The NDAA specifically codifies the ability to indefinitely detain people suspected of terrorism for the first time. This is wrong in its own part. It gets much more serious in that it does not specifically exclude American citizens from indefinite detention. Essentially, the government now has the right, codified by law, to imprison Americans indefinitely by the military without due process if it wants to, but only until the end of conflict. An amendment was introduced to correct this but failed. Just live it with fellow citizens, the government won't imprison you. Even if they do, it's only until the War on Terror ends. Signing this act Obama wrote, "I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations..." Everyone else should too.
Matthew Curry is a junior majoring in political science and environmental studies. Please tweet your feedback to @dailycardinal or e-mail your thoughts to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
