Senator Joe Lieberman Follows Up His 'Report Blog As Terrorist' Letter By Asking Twitter To Block Pro-Taliban Feeds
from the seems-it-would-be-simpler-to-just-revoke-the-Senator's-internet-access dept
Joe Lieberman is at it again. And by "it," I mean throwing around the word "terrorist" as an excuse to further sanitize the web for our "protection." Having already talked Google into allowing users to flag Youtube videos as "terrorist," Lieberman went a step further, asking for the "Report as Terrorist" option to be applied to Blogger as well.Having taken a swing at long-form blogging, Lieberman is now taking the fight to the other end of the "wordiness" spectrum: Twitter.
Senators want to stop feeds which boast of insurgent attacks on Nato forces in Afghanistan and the casualties they inflict. Aides for Joe Lieberman, chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said the move was part of a wider attempt to eliminate violent Islamist extremist propaganda from the internet and social media. The Taliban movement has embraced the social network as part of its propaganda effort and regularly tweets about attacks or posts links to its statements.Like everyone else in this digital age, the Taliban is using various social media to communicate with its fans. But why should our Senators be concerned about what the Taliban had for lunch? And more importantly, why do they feel so deeply that forcing Twitter to block these feeds will prevent future "violent Islamist extremist" action? If NATO forces are attacked and no one tweets about it, does it change the outcome?
The feeds named in the Telegraph article (@ABalkhi and @alemarahweb) are about as "threatening" as a Westboro Bapist Church Twitter account, with a few facts tucked away between tweet after tweet filled with jingoistic statements and "preaching to the converted." The very idea that blocking feeds like this will deter or diminish future Taliban activity is laughable at best, and disingenuous grandstanding at worst. In fact, it makes Lieberman and his fellow Senators nothing more than "preaching to the converted" grandstanders, scoring easy points with voters who still somehow believe the only thing Twitter has to offer is lunch descriptions and terrorist propaganda.
As for Twitter, it won't even confirm whether or not Lieberman has asked it to block the feeds.
Rachel Bremer, a spokesman for Twitter, said: "This isn't something we'd comment on."Not only that, but Twitter won't have to block these feeds no matter how nicely Lieberman asks because the Taliban is not registered as a terrorist organization by the State Department. Any censorship applied by Twitter would pretty much just be a personal favor to Joe, rather than a government-sanctioned shutdown.
Lieberman obviously believes that his success with Youtube filtering should be applied to every area of the internet. He's already gone after the long (Blogger) and the short (Twitter) which means his next request for "Report as Terrorist" buttons will be sent to Tumblr, possibly resulting in the removal of f*ckyeahterrorism.tumblr.com and ryangoslingtaliban.tumblr.com.
One has to wonder why Lieberman is so persistent in his attempts to turn every form of social media into a scattershot weapon aimed at the angry words and hashtags of "Islamist extremists." Possibly a core chunk of his key demographic responds well to blaming the internet for terrorism, but that seems unlikely. Maybe he just likes to see his name in print and, much like four-year-olds and Lindsay Lohan, firmly believes any "attention" is "good attention."
[Press here to "Report Senator as Idiot."]
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: blogs, joe lieberman, terrorism, twitter
Companies: twitter
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Granted this is a great oversimplification but I really do think we are just feeding the fire. Another thing that we have messed up on is this stupid security. The stupid TSA is worse than the terrorists. Terrorists are limited in numbers and scattered around the globe. TSA is there and ready to molest you every time you go near an airplane.
Basicly the terrorist are winning in that they have destroyed our way of life. They don't even have to do anything any more. Every day we have to live with our rights being taken away and they no longer have to do any work. Terrorist just sit back and watch as we hurt ourselves in the name of feeling "safe"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
We are already giving up freedoms to protect us from the bad guys.
I know the benefits of spying on each other. But I don't feel safer...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
That I think is exactly the issue we are up against. Most people now are ok with loosing these right even though they don't make you feel safer. The problem is that the government is slowly taking away one our rights a few at a time in the name of safety. They have to protect us from the "terrorist". At this point I consider the government the terrorist. The government is much worse than any of these terrorist could ever hope to be.
The terrorist are very limited in what they are able to do. Half the time it seems they cant even blow themselves up properly. I mean really, we are afraid of a group that for one is made up of people crazy enough to blow themselves up. Then these people are so stupid they cant even make a bomb that works. Any kid who passed high school chemistry should can make something blow up!
So out of a fear of a small group of apparently suicidal uneducated people we are giving up our rights? How does this make any sense? You cannot honestly stand and argue to me that another even like 911 could happen today. If you stand up in a plane today and say you are taking it over you will not live long enough to make it 10 steps. The other people on the plane will no longer tolerate it. Only reason it worked that day was because the people on the plane thought they were going to be held for ransom or something. Now that it is clear a hijacker plans to kill everyone people will not just sit quietly.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
Will never happen, far too many companies depend on the whole terrorism scare playing on a regular basis in the media so they can score those juicy government contracts.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Shut up Lieberman and leave our freedoms alone.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Sounds exactly like Lieberman's actions to me. Where can I go to report him as a terrorist?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I'm required to input an "issue"
Um, so what would this issue be defined as?
Identity theft (badly impersonating a person with a brain?)
Endangered Species (people with brains?)
Civil Liberties/Civil Rights (not discriminating against people without brains?)
Ethanol (sniffing it?)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I'm required to input an "issue"
I also advised the esteemed senator to retake his college civics course.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
A few centuries ago remember how Galileo said that the Earth orbited the Sun? Well the Catholic Church saw the dangers of the Earth orbiting the sun! Imagine how dizzy we'd all get spinning in circles every day! So the church put Galileo on trial for being a Heretic, and their conviction successfully stopped the Earth from orbiting the Sun!
But then some more evil scientists came along years later to spread the lie that the Earth orbited the Sun! The poor Catholic Church wasn't able to shut them all up, so then the Sun stopped orbiting the Earth and the Earth started spinning around and orbiting the Sun! Why else do you think we have more problems with strong wind gusts in the forms of hurricanes and tornado's then we used to? It couldn't be because we only started them one or two hundred years ago! It's those evil scientists who created the wind by telling everyone the Earth orbits the Sun!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
You know every now and then, I feel the urge to write something so utterly offensive that I really ought to use Tor....
[Press here to "Report Joe Lieberman as Jew."]
As others have noted, the overwhelming problem with the “Godwin's law” internet meme is that it instantly halts discussions about the nation's move towards totalitarianism.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
joe is living proof of this.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
This was much more a petty and vindictive attack due to what was perceived as a personal slight than it was a dogmatic issue.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: He was put on trial because, as a preface to that idea, he would say that the Pope was wrong.
So he said nothing that could be interpreted as casting aspersions on the Catholic Church, or on the Pope, at all. He was persecuted purely because he stated a scientific fact.
Revisionism seems to be quite popular among the religious apologists, even today...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Facebook to the rescue!
Facebook will make millions.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
This failed in Northern Ireland
I thought that US politicians kept in touch with major historic events on the island of Ireland, given the number of US voters of Irish descent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_the_Republic_of_Ireland
http://www.sinnfein. ie/contents/16335
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: This failed in Northern Ireland
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: This failed in Northern Ireland
Her memory was inspired in the Americans.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: This failed in Northern Ireland
Dory.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: This failed in Northern Ireland
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: This failed in Northern Ireland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOUeauLWEaE
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Scary
Perhaps I'm taking it too far but between things like this, SOPA/PIPA, and NDAA make it clear that the powers that be want to stifle speech and demonize dissidents.
I can't tell if they are just power grabbing or if they are really afraid that the people will one day wake up and try to revolt.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Scary
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Scary
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Scary
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Scary
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
What he wants apparently is to establish a beachhead to then further censorship and ingrain it in the public view, the man is a menace to freedom and democracy and should not be in office.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
All Set to Go Ballistic but...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Can we?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Why are you violating your oath of office by pursuing the censorship of anything? Do you realize that by advocating such you are suggesting a violation of the 1st amendment? While a corporation is not bound by the bill of rights in in the manner that the government is in most respects, a US Senator certainly is and should be ashamed of such a breech of their oath to protect the Constitution. In fact, I would go so far as to say such an event calls for the impeachment of any elected official who participates in such despicable behavior.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Because I like that idea. A lot.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
WELCOME BACK MCCARTHY
Fuck them.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Does Lieberman NOT understand that censoring the Taliban will only bring more attention to them?
Countries have made denying the holocaust a "Hate Crime" either by direct legislation or culturally and politically (which nicely draws the USA in and, Lieberman once again) which hasn't stopped that either.
Being a neo-Nazi is straight out illegal in Germany but there do seem to be an awful lot of them around these days.
White supremacist sites are often prosecuted as hate crimes in countries that have them yet they still thrive. Proving, if nothing else, that tribalism is alive and well and still as dangerous as it's always been.
(Something Lieberman, himself, proves over and over again in his unquestioning support of Israel.)
Censorship doesn't help anything. Driving what you censor underground almost always makes it worse (anti-drug laws). And always makes it harder for law enforcement agencies to keep track of that the genuinely dangerous ones are doing.
To quote Bob Dylan "When will we ever learn". (note: That's fair use!)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The obvious
IF he were a member of the opposition, ie: not a Democrat, there would have been repeated flogging of the "R" word, and more than likely allegations about linkage to the "T" Party.
Might it be bias in someone's reporting style?. Incomplete/partial truth, as usual, and what it's trying to conceal just stinks even more.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The obvious
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The obvious
What are you talking about? Connecticut Democrats purged the “useless sack of crap” from the party ranks back in 2006.
Maybe you wonder just exactly how he stayed on as senator after the Connecticut Stalinists ordered him into political gulag? A lot of people wonder about that.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: The obvious
Nice work ,but 0/10 for attention.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Sadness
I may not agree with what you say, but I will give my life to protect your right to say it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Sadness
From the New York Times, “Secret U.S. Memo Made Legal Case to Kill a Citizen”, by Charlie Savage, October 8, 2011:
Contrast that presidential act carefully against not only the Fifth Amendment, which uses the phrase “due process“, but also contrast that presidential act against the ancestral document, Magna Carta, done at Runnymede, 1215, which uses the phrase “legem terre”:
“Secret U.S. Memo Made Legal Case to Kill a Citizen”, New York Times, October 8, 2011.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Terrorists are the excuse.... Control is the objective
The goal of terrorists is to instill fear in the populace, and I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm a hell of a lot more afraid of our government now than before the terrorist 'attack' on the twin towers.
The other goal of terrorists is to destroy resources or cause them to be used for non productive purposes.... and again they have succeeded. How much money has been wasted in the 'crusade' to prevent the next 'X' attack? How much of that money could have gone to more productive and useful activities if not for our government?
If the terrorists didn't exist, the government would invent someone else to be the new 'boogeyman' (now that Russia is no longer a threat, and China could just buy us if they wanted to). They have to have someone to point at when they proclaim, "SOMETHING MUST BE DONE ABOUT THEM...." (why do you think there are two major political parties....)
Now where did I leave that tinfoil, I think I feel one of those 'men who smoke goats' looking for me...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
RE Analog
We should be directly voting on all these laws not our "alleged" representatives.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well, I did contact some of my Connecticut cousins as promised. No response. Of course, seeing as they're sentient lifeforms, they may be voting against their fine senator already. Then again, I don't actually know what their politics are like (though two of them did occupy Wall Street).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well, I did contact some of my Connecticut cousins as promised. No response. Of course, seeing as they're sentient lifeforms, they may be voting against their fine senator already. Then again, I don't actually know what their politics are like (though two of them did occupy Wall Street).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well, I did contact some of my Connecticut cousins as promised. No response. Of course, seeing as they're sentient lifeforms, they may be voting against their fine senator already. Then again, I don't actually know what their politics are like (though two of them did occupy Wall Street).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Leiberman and blocking Taliban emails
[ link to this | view in chronology ]