-- On 4 Apr 2005 at 12:47, Shawn Duffy wrote:

http://www.regulations.gov/freddocs/05-06521.htm

Public comments due June 3rd.

...

From the Summary: "The Federal Election Commission requests comments on proposed changes to its rules that would include paid advertisements on the Internet in the definition of ``public communication.'' These changes to the Commission's rules would implement the recent decision of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in Shays v. Federal Election Commission, which held that the current definition of ``public communication'' impermissibly excludes all Internet communications. Comment is also sought on the related definition of ``generic campaign activity'' and on proposed changes to the disclaimer regulations. Additionally, comment is sought on proposed new exceptions to the definitions of ``contribution'' and ``expenditure'' for certain Internet activities and communications that would qualify as individual volunteer activity or that would qualify for the ``press exemption.'' These proposals are intended to ensure that political committees properly finance and disclose their Internet communications, without impeding individual citizens from using the Internet to speak freely regarding candidates and elections.

"Properly finance" means that speech will be defined as paid for, even if no actual money changes hands. The proposed rule brings what was formerly speech into the definition of expenditure, even if assigning a money value is arbitrary. There is no real distinction between individual speech and campaign expenditure so broadly defined. Any distinction between the campaign and individual citizens is merely some arbitary cutoff. Perhaps comments in "A" list blogs might be defined as campaign expenditure, and comments in other blogs might be defined as individual. The obvious rule is "If the campaign does not pay money for it, it is not a campaign expenditure", but this rule is declared to be a loophole, a loophole that must be corrected - and of course it is a loophole. But it is a loophole that cannot be fixed without massive violation of free speech. Fixing this "loophole" is what is meant by "properly finance". To fix this "loophole", speech must be deemed to be campaign speech, at least if it is sufficiently prominent, and if it is not in fact paid for directed and planned by the campaign, this will be an offense, a form of fraud, cheating the campaign laws. This rule (speech is money, and unpaid for, unsupervised electoral speech is fraud) already applies in the offline world - thus the NRA is forbidden to inform voters about the way a particular politician votes on guns - at least forbidden to do so shortly before election time, because that would supposedly be a campaign expenditure. To get around this rule, the NRA has purchased some radio stations, thus availing itself of the press exemption, which allows the press, but not ordinary mortals, to comment on political races. The question then, is how will this prohibition against political speech on specific politicians and campaigns be applied to the internet. "A" list blogs claim to be the press, so the argument is that "A" list blogs should be exempt from this rule because they are the press, "B" list blogs exempt because they are individuals, so no regulation of internet speech. Evidently some people reject this argument. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG m5dzJ3SI7awps9BM2r6oU3sTR7bm6M+PgfNxX2Ki 4oWzYp9hbWL2AKzCa8cowYZ4jXXJftNhUSH9LQHsL