Biden Revokes Trump's Silly Executive Order On Section 230; But It Already Did Its Damage

from the too-late dept

It's better than nothing -- especially given that Biden has been so vocal against Section 230 -- but last week, Biden rescinded Trump's ridiculous executive order about Section 230. As you may recall, almost exactly a year ago, Trump issued an absolutely insane executive order demanding the FCC reinterpret Section 230. As we noted at the time, this made no sense, as 230 was written with the explicit admonition that the point was to keep the FCC out of the business of regulating the internet.

At any point in the process, those involved in the federal government could have stood up to Trump and said that everything about the executive order was a joke and ridiculous. But, nope, that's not how things work apparently. NTIA, which was in the process of being handed over to a lawyer whose mission in life seems to be to lie about and destroy Section 230 (partly to favor his white nationalist clients), followed through on Trump's demands, and petitioned the FCC to reinterpret Section 230.

Then, Ajit Pai had every opportunity to do the right thing and say that this was way outside of the FCC's jurisdiction -- as he had years earlier before Trump even knew what Section 230 was. Instead, he let the charade play on, wasted everyone's time and energy in needing to explain to Pai why the FCC had no authority... and then ignored all of the legal precedent and every ounce of whatever principles he supposedly had, and agreed to do a rulemaking on 230. Of course, what might have suddenly drained Pai of any basic decency was the fact that when his colleague Michael O'Rielly actually spoke the truth, Trump fired him. O'Rielly came out of this nonsense with principles, while Pai came out of it looking like a Trump lapdog with no principles whatsoever.

Pai only finally ditched the idea right after January 6th when everyone was focused on the insurrection on Capitol Hill, and he realized that he could dispose of the news while Trump's attention was elsewhere.

Still, the whole thing was a huge waste of time, and has completely polluted the dialogue about Section 230 with utter nonsense. It's good that Biden rescinded the order, though it was way too late. Meanwhile, the author of the original executive order, Nathan Simington... got O'Rielly's vacant seat on the FCC, guaranteeing that the two Republicans on the Committee are now anti-1st Amendment, anti-Section 230.

Trump didn't end up getting the FCC to issue a reinterpretation of Section 230, but he still did a ton of damage to the dialogue around Section 230, with tremendous help from Adam Candeub, Nathan Simington, and Ajit Pai.

Filed Under: adam candeub, ajit pai, donald trump, fcc, joe biden, nathan simington, nist, section 230

Cable Lobby Working Hard To Ensure Biden Broadband Plan Doesn't Encourage Real Competition

from the do-not-pass-go,-do-not-collect-$200 dept

While the Biden administration's $2 trillion American Jobs Plan set aside $100 billion for broadband infrastructure, the details of how that money is to actually be spent remains murky. Enter cable industry lobbyists, who are hard at work attempting to dictate who gets access to those funds, while also trying to make sure the funds aren't used for anything that could threaten their regional monopolies. They're particularly worried about the Biden administration's promise that a big focus of the effort will be on giving aid to locally owned and operated broadband networks, as detailed in this good piece by Issie Lapowsky at Protocol:

"Comcast, Charter, AT&T and their respective industry associations have spent years beating back municipal broadband networks in states across the country, lobbying for laws that prohibit such networks and arguing that government-funded broadband puts the thumb on the scale of competition. With potentially $100 billion in federal funding on the line, the last thing the cable lobby wants is to see those restrictions lifted and funding diverted to cities, not their own coffers."

Granted as we've noted for years, these communities aren't getting into the broadband business because it's fun. They're doing so as an organic, voter-backed response to decades of market failure and regional monopolization. Said monopolization is obviously hugely profitable, and the cable industry lobby is working overtime to prevent anything upsetting that broken status quo. As Lapowsky notes, Charter and Comcast alone spent $7 million on lobbying Congress last year, and that doesn't including the millions in additional dollars spent by their policy and lobbying organizations like the NCTA (run by former FCC boss Mike Powell).

Nor does that tally include the millions spent annually by AT&T and Verizon on an army of consultants, lobbyists, think tankers, academics, and astroturfers, all of whom are now working overtime to ensure a lot of that money goes into their pockets, and not the pockets of regional community broadband networks threatening to bring real competition to bear. Networks that wouldn't exist if America's entrenched telecom monopolies actually cared about things like competition and consumer welfare.

Historically, the telecom lobby has had success after success when it comes to ensuring the U.S. government doesn't take regional monopolization and corruption seriously. But as Protocol notes, COVID (specifically news stories showing toddlers having to huddle in the dirt just to get online for class because home broadband either isn't available or is too expensive) has changed the dynamic and really showcased the harm of monopolization and corruption:

"But as this fight moves from the states to the federal level, local broadband proponents have some advantages they haven't had before. They don't just have the backing of the White House and support of Democrats who control Congress. They also have more than a year's worth of examples of how people on the wrong side of the digital divide in both cities and rural America have struggled during the pandemic — and how cable giants have failed to fill the gap."

Even then, some community broadband proponents are expressing concern that the telecom lobby is already having a negative impact on the important terminology being used at departments like Treasury to dictate where U.S. government funding is going to go:

"Earlier this year in March, the Biden Administration signed the American Rescue Plan Act, which included, among many other things, multiple sources of funds for broadband infrastructure. The U.S. Department of Treasury was tasked with writing the rules of how local governments can spend the various funds. The Interim Rule has been published and it appears to significantly limit local ability to invest in needed networks."

While community broadband is framed by telecom as "socialism run amok" or a "government takeover of the internet" to try and encourage partisan division, being pro-competition and pro-accountability is yet another subject that isn't actually partisan. Most community broadband networks have been built in conservative areas with the support of local voters. And again, the telecom lobby has a 25 year history of fighting tooth and nail against all broadband competition, not just community-run broadband. While getting slathered in tax breaks and subsidies for networks they routinely half deliver.

It has taken a quarter century to even get the U.S. broadband policy conversation to the point where we can admit (barely!) that monopolization and regulatory capture (corruption) are the two primary reasons U.S. broadband is expensive and mediocre. It's not clear how many more decades it will take to actually do something about it.

Filed Under: american jobs plan, broadband, community broadband, competition, infrastructure, joe biden, municipal broadband

Biden Administration Poised To Give Comcast Lobbyist Canadian Ambassador Spot

from the do-not-pass-go,-do-not-collect-$200 dept

While the Biden administration still hasn't fully staffed the gridlocked FCC, it does appear to be ready to reward a top Comcast lobbyist and key Biden fundraising ally with a cushy new post.

According to the Washington Post, the Biden administration appears poised to "probably" give top Comcast lobbyist David Cohen the position of Canadian Ambassador, with a planned announcement likely coming in May:

"David Cohen, a Comcast executive who hosted Biden’s first official 2020 presidential fundraising event, probably will be nominated as U.S. ambassador to Canada."

Cohen is, if you're unfamiliar, one of the architects of Comcast's relentless monopolistic domination of US telecom, steering the company through numerous power consolidating mergers while assuring regulators that Comcast's growing power was nothing to be concerned about. Granted time showcased it was very much something to be concerned about, as Comcast's steadily growing monopoly over broadband (especially at faster speeds) is directly responsible for soaring US broadband prices, spotty coverage, and historically terrible customer service courtesy of steadily-eroding competition.

Cohen was dubbed a "wonk rock star" by the Washington Post back in 2012 for selling regulators on the 2011 Comcast NBC Universal merger. This was largely done using Internet Essentials, a program that promises discounted broadband access to low-income families. The plan was criticized heavily at first for being regulator window dressing that was intentionally difficult to qualify for while offering substandard speeds, something only fixed by Comcast after annoyed parents in Philadelphia protested in the streets (protestors who believe the program doesn't do enough to offset Comcast's overall harm were still protesting last year).

Internet Essentials was extremely helpful as a way to advertise Comcast's boundless altruism, despite the fact Comcast's monopolization and mergermania was heavily responsible for unaffordable US internet access in the first place. As the program has been launched and relaunched a thousand times over, it has provided Comcast with a bottomless well of promotional material featuring Cohen posing over the desks of beaming children. Of course the program provided something else as well: lobbying cover for access to federal, state, and local lawmakers.

Under feeble US lobbying laws, if an employee spends more than 20% of their time lobbying in DC, they have to register with the government as a lobbyist, detail their travel with lawmakers, and more fully outline their contributions to politicians and foundations. So to get around these restrictions, many companies simply call their lobbyists and policy wonks...something else. In Comcast's case, Cohen spent much of his time as the company's "Chief Diversity Officer." Around 2019 Comcast thankfully hired somebody genuinely diverse to be Chief Diversity Officer, and Cohen's role shifted to one of "counselor and adviser." Comcast has historically gotten mad at me for calling Cohen a lobbyist, despite the fact that lobbying has always clearly made up a huge percentage of his work.

Again, the news of Cohen's reward comes despite the fact the Biden team still hasn't appointed a third Democratic Commissioner (and possible permanent boss) at the FCC, leaving it mired in partisan gridlock after the rushed appointment of Trump ally Nathan Simington. Hopefully the FCC appointment comes soon, given that rewarding telecom lobbyists before you've gotten around to staffing your top telecom regulator probably won't be a great look for an administration hoping to get a vague but promising broadband agenda off the ground.

Filed Under: ambassadors, canada, david cohen, diversity, joe biden, lobbyists
Companies: comcast

Civil Rights Groups Argue That Biden Should Drop Assange Prosecution; Noting That It Is An Attack On Journalism

from the do-it dept

It's easy to dislike and distrust Julian Assange. He's done many things to inspire both reactions. Still, it's important to separate out personal feelings towards the guy with the question of whether or not he broke US law with publishing the things he did via Wikileaks. For years, the Obama DOJ refused to indict him, in part due to the recognition that nearly all of Assange's activities were similar to the kinds of things that journalists do all the time. The Trump DOJ had no such restraint (even as some prosecutors warned of problems with the idea), and as we and others have pointed out the indictment is a huge threat to investigative journalism and things like source protection.

Now that Biden is President, a whole bunch of civil rights groups have sent a letter to Acting Attorney General Monty Wilkinson, asking him to drop the case against Assange. The letter notes that many of the signatories do not agree with Assange or Wikileaks, but that doesn't mean the case is a good one:

While our organizations have different perspectives on Mr. Assange and his organization, we share the view that the government’s indictment of him poses a grave threat to press freedom both in the United States and abroad. We urge you to drop the appeal of the decision by Judge Vanessa Baraitser of the Westminster Magistrates’ Court to reject the Trump administration’s extradition request. We also urge you to dismiss the underlying indictment.

The indictment of Mr. Assange threatens press freedom because much of the conduct described in the indictment is conduct that journalists engage in routinely—and that they must engage in in order to do the work the public needs them to do. Journalists at major news publications regularly speak with sources, ask for clarification or more documentation, and receive and publish documents the government considers secret. In our view, such a precedent in this case could effectively criminalize these common journalistic practices.

In addition, some of the charges included in the indictment turn entirely on Mr. Assange’s decision to publish classified information. News organizations frequently and necessarily publish classified information in order to inform the public of matters of profound public significance. We appreciate that the government has a legitimate interest in protecting bona fide national security interests, but the proceedings against Mr. Assange jeopardize journalism that is crucial to democracy.

Jameel Jaffer, who heads the Knight First Amendment Institute, which was on of the signatories on the letter, has written an article also detailing why the Biden DOJ should drop the case that is worth reading:

Of Trump’s many attacks on press freedom, however, it’s his Justice Department’s indictment of Julian Assange that could have the most significant implications over the long term. As I explained here and here, the Justice Department’s indictment of Assange focuses principally on activity that national security journalists engage in “routinely and as a necessary part of their work”—cultivating sources, communicating with them confidentially, soliciting information from them, protecting their identities from disclosure, and publishing classified information. As a result, a successful prosecution of Assange would have far-reaching implications both for national security journalists and for the news organizations that publish their work. This isn’t an accident. It’s likely why the Trump administration filed the indictment, as Jack Goldsmith observed here.

President Joe Biden plainly does not share Trump’s attitude toward the press. But the Assange case will present the Biden administration with an early test. One of the first questions Biden’s new attorney general will confront is whether to authorize prosecutors to continue to contest the decision of the Westminster Magistrates’ Court, issued earlier this year, denying the United States’ request for Assange’s extradition. In an interview with NPR, the outgoing U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Zachary Terwilliger, wondered whether the new administration would abandon the appeal. “Some of this does come down to resources and where you’re going to focus your energies,” Terwilliger noted.

Again, whether you agree with Assange's view of the world, or how you feel about Wikileaks' apparent decision to cozy up with Russians is a separate issue from whether the indictment itself is a threat to journalism. It is. And the new DOJ should drop the case. It would be unfortunately if Biden continued along the same path the Obama administration did in pretending that journalism is a form of espionage. Dumping the Assange suit would send a clear signal that Biden actually recognizes the value and importance of adversarial investigative journalism, even if it might embarrass him.

Filed Under: doj, espionage act, free speech, joe biden, journalism, julian assange

No, Revoking Section 230 Would Not 'Save Democracy'

from the what-is-wrong-with-you-people? dept

Steven Hill, the former policy director with the Center for Humane Technologies -- the non-profit that everyone seems to look to as some sort of knowledgeable source on "anti-Big Tech" talking points -- has come out with one of the most ridiculous op-eds regarding Section 230. And I say that as someone who seems to wade through a dozen or so terrible Section 230 op-eds every day. The title alone, should already make you nervous, but honestly this piece is so bad, so wrong, and so disconnected from reality, it completely undermines the Center for Humane Technology's credibility, even though this guy is no longer associated with them.

The piece is titled: Biden should revoke Section 230 before we lose our democracy, which is just bizarre framing, but I'm open-minded enough to give any piece about Section 230 at least a chance to make its arguments.

Of course, it starts off on the wrong foot since, you know, Biden literally cannot revoke Section 230. That's not how any of this works. You'd think that at least someone would point out that the President doesn't get to just revoke laws that Congress passed and were signed into law. That's just not how any of it works. But... maybe it's just a clueless editor at the Chicago Tribune and the article itself is better... Or maybe not.

The 1st half of the article is basically one long "correlation / not causation" error. It talks about how we now have big internet companies and before we didn't -- and now we also have Trumpism, and before we didn't. Ergo, the theory goes, big tech is somehow responsible for Trumpism. There is not even any attempt to logically connect the two, it's just stated as if it's obvious:

Since the birth of the Big Tech media platforms 15 years ago, democracies around the world have been subjected to a grand experiment: Can a nation’s news and information infrastructure, which is the lifeblood of any democracy, be dependent on digital technologies that allow a global free speech zone of unlimited audience size, combined with algorithmic (nonhuman) curation of massive volumes of mis/disinformation, that can be spread with unprecedented ease and reach?

The evidence has become frighteningly clear that this experiment has veered off course, like a Frankenstein monster marauding across the landscape.

Hill seems totally unaware that we've gone through other periods in history in which nationalists/fascists/populists have become popular and taken over countries. I don't remember social media being to blame for Europe in the 1930s, but maybe I missed it in my history books.

But, even if this was accurate (and it's not), it's still not clear Section 230 has anything to do with any of this (because it doesn't, even in this fantasy world in which social media is responsible for Trumpism/nationalism). The connection to 230, like his connection between social media and growing nationalism is just some random weak correlation bullshit: these companies like Section 230, ergo, any bad things I think have come from these companies, must be the fault of Section 230.

Notably, of course, the essay makes no effort to engage with what problem he's actually trying to solve other than hand-wavey "threats to democracy," nor any attempt to explore how Section 230 works or what role it has here. It just seems to assume that if you removed Section 230, these non-defined problems would be fix.

It is time to push reset in a major way. President Joe Biden should start by revoking Section 230 of 1996′s Communications Decency Act. That’s the law that grants Big Tech Media “blank check” immunity for the mass content that is published and broadcast across their platforms. Revoking Section 230 is not a perfect solution, but it would make these companies somewhat more responsible, deliberative and potentially liable for the worst of their toxic content, including illegal content. Just like traditional media is liable.

No, Steven, that's not how any of this works. They would be "liable" for what, exactly? What is illegal about "toxic" content? What toxic content violates the law, that would somehow make the platforms liable? What is the actual cause of action? He doesn't answer that because the answer is none, whatsoever.

Also it's an ignorant fool's pipedream to believe that removing Section 230 would make companies "more responsible" or "deliberative." How do I know? Because unlike Steven, I actually study this stuff, and look at other areas of the law and the world where they don't have Section 230. For example, even in the US, we already have the DMCA for copyright, which has a regime (notice-and-takedown) that is what most people assume would develop in a world absent Section 230. And how's that working out? Do we see platforms dealing with user-generated content being "more responsible and deliberate" regarding copyright claims?

[insert uproarious laughter here]

No, of course not. What we have instead are companies who are quick to pull down all sorts of perfectly legitimate content to avoid any threat of liability. They practically knock themselves over to takedown content. And studies have shown that a huge number of DMCA takedowns are abusive and not about legitimate copyright claims. Remove 230 and we'll get a lot more of that, and a huge amount of stifling of perfectly fine speech based on a legalistic heckler's veto.

Why do newspapers like the Chicago Tribune let people who clearly have no understanding of this issue write op-eds for them?

Of course, immediately after that Hill recognizes that it wasn't social media that incited the mob to invade the Capitol, but the President, and admits that his own proposed solution is really kinda... not going to help.

But let’s be clear: Some of the worst past outrages would not likely be affected by 230′s revocation. While President Donald Trump’s inciting speech to the mob about a stolen election was false and provocative, other media outlets publish untrue nonsense all the time. It would be difficult to prove legally that any particular individuals or institutions were harmed or motivated by the president’s many outrageous statements.

So revoking Section 230 will likely not have as much impact as its proponents wish or its critics fear.

So then why did you write a whole essay calling for the revocation when you admit it won't actually work?

Then he switches arguments, like he's a Twitter troll and people have called him out for not knowing what he's talking about. Instead of talking about 230, he jumps to another dumb argument: that internet companies should be regulated like public utilities.

The Biden administration should treat these companies more like investor-owned utilities, as the U.S. previously did with telephone, railroad and power companies. (Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has suggested such an approach.)

As utilities, they would be guided by a digital license — just like traditional bricks-and-mortar companies must apply for various licenses and permits — that defines the rules and regulations of the business model according to a “duty of care” obligation, a kind of Hippocratic oath that says “first, do no harm.”

That... is also not how any of this works. First of all, utilities tend to have "must carry" rules, which would do the opposite of what Hill himself claimed was the reason we needed 230 in the first place! Second of all, the entire point of having utilities is when you have natural monopolies over commodity style, non-differentiated products. That's not true of social media. Third, if they were regulated by the government in the manner that Hill seems to want, you'd run into serious state actor problems, potentially making any "duty of care" obligations to be subject to a 1st Amendment analysis, meaning that all of the speech Hill wants them to take down to "protect democracy" would have to be left up because it's mostly protected by the 1st Amendment.

This isn't just an ignorant argument from someone who doesn't understand the issues. It's a self-contradicting one!

And then he totally shifts arguments again!

One abuse that is ripe for stricter rules is “data grabs” of users’ personal info. These companies never asked for permission to start sucking up our private data, or to track our physical locations, or mass collect every “like,” “share” and “follow” into psychographic profiles of each user that can be targeted and manipulated by advertisers and bad political actors. The platforms started that sneaky practice secretly, forging their destructive brand of “surveillance capitalism.”

Surveillance capitalism! Drink! So he's gone from a "they've allowed bad people online" argument, to "they're a utility" argument (which contradicts the first argument) to now a privacy argument... which has nothing at all to do with Section 230.

Why would anyone ever trust this guy to opine on anything related to this subject?

These companies’ frequent outrages against our humanity are supposedly the price we must pay for being able to post our summer vacation and new puppy pics to our “friends,” or for political dissidents and whistleblowers to alert the world to their just causes. Those are all important uses, but the price paid is very high. We can do better.

I think the Chicago Tribune can do a lot better and maybe find someone who actually knows what they're talking about to opine on this stuff?

Though, at least, the paper did juxtapose this utter dumpster fire of an op-ed with a much better one from Will Duffield talking about the dangers of repealing Section 230, but it's stunning that the first one made it to print at all.

Filed Under: democracy, joe biden, privacy, section 230, steven hill
Companies: center for humane technologies

Biden Fires Steve Bannon Protege, Who Tried To Turn Voice Of America Into A New Breitbart

from the and-he-whines-about-partisanship-on-the-way-out dept

Last summer we covered how Trump had hired Michael Pack, a protégé of Steve Bannon, to run US Agency for Global Media. USAGM is the organization that runs Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia, and Middle East Broadcasting. It also runs the Open Technology Fund (which itself spun out of Radio Free Europe, and helped to fund a variety of important technologies for enabling free speech among dissidents and activists). It was clear from the beginning that Pack's plan was to (a) recraft the media organizations to be propaganda machines and (b) shift OTF's funding to some organizations with security/encryption techniques that were not widely trusted. Pack fired a bunch of people in a move that a court later rejected, noting that Pack did not have the authority to do so.

He also began a witch hunt at Voice of America, seeking to investigate journalists for "anti-Trump bias" and get rid of them. A reporter who asked a perfectly reasonable question to Mike Pompeo was reassigned.

As we pointed out, this kind of meddling, beyond likely breaking the law, was also doing tremendous damage to the credibility of these organizations, and certainly to the important technical work that OTF funds.

So it was good to see that one of Biden's first moves upon getting into office was to demand Pack's resignation and also to shuffle the leadership at Voice of America.

In an act of true projection, on the way out the door Pack whined about how being fired was a partisan act and would harm credibility. This is all bullshit. From day one, Pack was a partisan hack who tried to turn Voice of America into a pro-Trump media organization.

Whether or not people like or appreciate the work that USAGM and its various organizations do, there is no doubt that Pack's efforts harmed those organizations' credibility. Good riddance.

Filed Under: joe biden, michael pack, otf, partisanship, propaganda, steve bannon, usagm, voice of america
Companies: otf, usagm, voice of america

Bad Idea: President-Elect Biden Wants To Turn 1/6 Into The New 9/11

from the let's-not dept

Many of us watched in horror as Trump supporters -- encouraged by the outgoing President's insinuation that a "stolen" election could be overturned if VP Mike Pence was prevented from certifying election results -- raided the Capitol building in Washington, DC. What may have started as simple MAGA stupidity ended with five people dead and two improvised explosive devices recovered. Welcome to Leroy Jenkinsville, USA.

Invading federal buildings is a serious federal offense. That's why Trump sent federal officers to Portland -- officers that spent a lot of time shooting and pepper spraying journalists and legal observers. There was a lot of irony contained in the Capitol invasion by Trump supporters -- ones who feel the government can do no wrong when their boy is in charge but cannot be trusted the moment the guy up top is replaced.

But the most painful irony still lies ahead. An executive order from Trump signed in June was meant to target "anarchists and left wing extremists" who tore down monuments to Confederate "heroes" and otherwise menaced federal property. Now, it looks like the latest citizens to be hit with sentence enhancements will be the same people who cheered on this open targeting of people whose views were diametrically opposed to Trump's. "Fullest extent of the law" -- as ordered in the Presidential edict -- means pursuing maximum sentences for attacking federal property.

As horrifying as all of that was, the worst may lie ahead. The incoming president is threatening to turn January 6th into the next 9/11. (h/t Jameel Jaffer)

President-elect Joe Biden characterized the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday as domestic terrorists, referring to the violence as “one of the darkest days in the history of our nation.”

“Don’t dare call them protesters,” Mr. Biden said in remarks from Wilmington, Del. “They were a riotous mob. Insurrectionists. Domestic terrorists. It’s that basic. It’s that simple.”

He's not wrong. Some of the acts -- especially the use of IEDs -- are the very definition of "domestic terrorism." The problem is what Biden wants to do about it.

Mr. Biden has said he plans to make a priority of passing a law against domestic terrorism, and he has been urged to create a White House post overseeing the fight against ideologically inspired violent extremists and increasing funding to combat them.

This may seem reasonable. And some renewed focus on the domestic side of terrorism might be warranted, considering how it's been back-burnered by law enforcement for, um, personal reasons. It's well documented that law enforcement agencies in the US -- including the FBI -- have ignored domestic extremists in favor of targeting people with darker skin and non-Christian faiths. Ignoring the domestic threat means not having to examine people law enforcement agencies have on their payrolls, far too many of whom have been caught espousing bigoted views in private.

But no matter how good it might feel to finally force law enforcement to confront people whose cognitive dissonance allows them to post ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ memes alongside their Blue Lives Matter content, there's absolutely no reason anyone should welcome another expansion of government power under the guise of fighting terrorism.

The 9/11 attacks vastly expanded the government's reach and grasp. And it has resulted in a lot of domestic surveillance -- much of which uses the pretense of being "foreign-facing" to excuse its intrusion into the lives of Americans. For years, the NSA was able to harvest phone metadata in bulk, almost all of which was generated by domestic communications. Backdoor searches of NSA collections allow the FBI and others to obtain domestic communications without a warrant. And the FBI's war on foreign terrorism has done little more than allow the agency to radicalize people right into lengthy prison sentences.

Add to that biometric collections at airports, no-fly lists that are almost impossible to challenge, and the court-supported belief that the rights of American citizens are null and void anywhere within 100 miles of a border, coast, or international airport, and you have dozens of reason why no one should celebrate a new, entirely-domestic, War on Terror.

What happened earlier this month was disturbing. And domestic terrorism is a threat that should be addressed. But emotional lawmaking in the wake of an attack has never worked out well for Americans, even if many would applaud the punishment of people they don't like. America's law enforcement already has the tools, funding, and power to tackle domestic terrorism. They just need to start doing it. What they don't need is a whole new set of powers. And what Americans really don't need is less freedom and liberty, no matter what threat we're facing.

Filed Under: domestic terrorism, joe biden, patriot act, surveillance