Saintless

I just got this email from Pete Ashdown:

I will be joining Congressman Chris Cannon to discuss his proposal for
nationwide free wireless Internet tonight at 8:00 PM on KSL Nightside.
KSL is broadcast in Utah on 102.7FM and 1160AM.

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=3118044

I’m very excited to see Pete Ashdown’s new blog post. It’s titled Obama for President.

[Update] Moments later came MoveOn.org’s endorsement.

In a resounding vote today, MoveOn.org Political Action’s members nationwide voted to endorse Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination for President. The group, with 3.2 million members nationwide and over 1.7 million members in Super Tuesday states, will immediately begin to mobilize on behalf of Senator Obama. The vote favored Senator Obama to Senator Clinton by 70.4% to 29.6%.

From a comment on Pete Ashdown’s blog:

I have received the following reply from Representative Daw:
I will be hosting a meeting here in the Capitol on Thursday, January
31st at 3:00 P.M. We will be discussing House Bill 139 about public
wireless access. I will be in attendance along with some members of the
Attorney General’s staff and members of the Xmission ISP staff. Anyone
is invited to attend, and please let us know if you will be able to.

The meeting will be held in the East (Senate) Building, in the Beehive
room which is just south of the cafeteria on the first floor. I hope to
see you there.

Representative Brad Daw is yet another elected official who doesn’t have a clue about technology. Hey, that’s ok by me. As long as said official is willing to get the advice of people who do have a clue. Daw, however, is not. He wants to shut down open wireless, such as Pete Ashdown’s service through Xmission. Check out what Pete has to say.

I haven’t yet read the text of this bill, but the most obvious thing to me is that if a kid has a laptop and is being left alone to use it, and the parents haven’t put filters or protective software on it, there’s a pretty bad parenting issue going on.

Oh, and what about companies where open wireless is a necessity?

There are a lot of reasons why this is a bad idea. I think this may become my pet project for a while (secondary to the Obama campaign, which has precious little time left [see Update]).

I asked Pete what we, as citizens, should and could do about this. For starters, call AND write to Rep. Daw. Secondly, join the UTPoliTech list and watch for news. If I have time before showdown on this bill, I’ll be trying to organize as many of us as find this important, to actively work against it. Please do join that list, or if you don’t want to (it’s low-volume), let me know directly, and I’ll try to keep you informed of any action taken.

[Update] By “precious little time left” in reference to the Obama campaign, I just mean that the primary race is almost over, and that is my entire scope of view for the presidential race right now. And with Utah (and 22 other states) having their primaries on February 5, there really isn’t much time left! And the heaviest part of my involvement with the campaign will be over, and things will go back to “normal”, whatever that is, so I’ll have more time to pick up a new pet project.

According to CNET, the House passed a bill saying that anyone offering an open wireless connection must report illegal images – including “obscene” cartoons and drawings, with fines of up to $300,000.

Apparently, it was rushed through, and passed 409 to 2. It’s reported to have been modified substantially from the original legislation, and is not available for public review. It’s never had a hearing or a committee vote.

According to the CNET article:

This is what the SAFE Act requires: Anyone providing an “electronic communication service” or “remote computing service” to the public who learns about the transmission or storage of information about certain illegal activities or an illegal image must (a) register their name, mailing address, phone number, and fax number with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s “CyberTipline” and (b) “make a report” to the CyberTipline that (c) must include any information about the person or Internet address behind the suspect activity and (d) the illegal images themselves.

Hello? They’re already required to report child porn. So, why the sneaky, rushed passing of this bill?

I’m as against the exploitation of children as anyone else. Personally, I wish they’d castrate offenders. And then maybe put them in front of a firing squad. Or send them to Gitmo.

But, the people that just rushed this through have no clue what this means to the businesses, and apparently don’t care about the privacy implications. They jumped on it because they want to protect children, but they don’t know what they’re doing. They didn’t examine it to see if it would actually do anything to protect children.

Of course, Pete Ashdown was running for Senate, and we have yet to see how the Senate will handle this. But, if the Senate does the same thing the House did, it’s rather scary. If Pete was in office, he’d have the knowledge to stand up and make sure the bill gets examined before becoming law. Can you imagine Hatch’s reaction? Maybe he’d have to add an amendment that says when the images are found, a device is transmitted via the airwaves and downloaded onto the person’s hard drive, and then assembled via nanobots to then reach out of the computer and slap the offender. Or something equally as stupid.

Normally, I think that age and wisdom can be valuable assets in our lawmakers. But, if they are going to be reactionary in making laws about something they don’t understand I think that they are not wise, but simply old.

Leftover from last year’s Senate campaign, I still get Google Alerts for Pete Ashdown. To my delight this morning, I received two news articles talking about how Pete has switched XMission completely over to renewable energy.

“As one of Utah’s top consumers of electricity, I am proud that XMission is setting the example for other businesses. You can eliminate pollution from your business and be economically viable,” said Pete Ashdown, President and founder of XMission.

With this recent upgrade, XMission has increased its renewable energy purchase by 412%. In addition to its participation in the Blue Sky program since 2006, XMission has implemented green standards in its own data center. These improved standards include upgrading equipment and increasing efficiency of power and cooling systems.

XMission also participates in Salt Lake City’s e2 Business Coalition, which helps Salt Lake area businesses reduce their carbon footprint and encourages earth-friendly business practices, such as recycling, efficient lighting, and other measures.

This is one more example of why I supported Pete last year, and plan to support him in his next bid for Utah State Senator.

Congratulations, Pete! And thank you!

I just received this email from Pete Ashdown through the UTPolitech mailing list (italics mine).

Government Competition and Privatization Subcommittee Meeting Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 at 9:00 AM

http://www.le.state.ut.us/Interim/2007/html/00001942.htm

They’re going to be discussing metropolitan fiber somewhere between 10:00 AM and “lunch”. Hooray for being able to enforce a timely agenda.

The specific legislation they’re discussing is requiring the voters in current members of UTOPIA to endorse new members joining. So if Salt Lake City wishes to join UTOPIA, then all of the other cities have to hold referendums to allow that. Hooray for “efficient and small government”. No accounting for the extra cost to cities has been given to my knowledge. No explanation as to why Brigham City needs to make decisions for Salt Lake City (or vice versa) has been defined.

This is corporate protectionism at its finest. All this legislation does is hold inevitable infrastructure back with red-tape.

Damn, I wish I could go. Why does all the good stuff happen when the average citizen can’t go give their input? I hope that some of the bloggers make it, I’d really like to know what happens.

KCPW says Pete Ashdown is going to be a featured speaker for tonight’s Peace Vigil and War Protest in honor of International Peace Day. The event is being put on by Mormons for Equality and Social Justice, as well as Radical Action Against War.

The event is being held outside of Orrin Hatch’s office in Provo at 7 PM tonight (Sept 21). The address is 51 South University Avenue in Provo.

Pete Ashdown, the Democratic challenger for Hatch’s senate seat in 2006, will be a featured speaker. He says he’ll take the opportunity to emphasize the last phrase of the Pledge of Allegiance, “and justice for all”:

“I think that’s not just ‘and justice for Americans,’ I believe that’s justice for everybody on the Earth. I want people to think about justice for people coming home from the war, people who have lost loved ones in the war, people who are in Guantanamo without trial, people in Iraq who have lost loved ones and the numbers of deaths and casualties we’ve had all around.”

I wonder if Hatch will call them nutcakes again? I love that Pete put the Nutcake bumper stickers out during his campaign. It’s definitely become a badge of honor, and I (to this day) have people honk and wave at me because of my Nutcake bumper sticker.