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IP: CWD--Net in "Starr" Role
From: Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 18:55:42 -0400
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 15:35:53 -0700 (PDT) From: "Brock N. Meeks" <brock () well com> CyberWire Dispatch//(c) Copyright 1998 // Jacking in from the "Ride that Hobby Horse, Newt" port: WASHINGTON-The craven jackals of Congress are at it again. In rushed pronouncements Thursday, Speaker Newt Gingrich promised that Independent Council Ken Starr's report on possible impeachable offenses regarding the President would be put on the Internet. Be still my heart. The hypocrisy of this move by Gingrich is breathtaking; once more Congress has turned the Net into its personal political football. Yes, the Starr report is a crucial public document and it should be online. It amazes me that when a document serves an obvious political purpose, this Congress spares no time or expense in making sure it get digitized and jack-hammered onto a web site. Congress has lived with the existence of the Internet now for four years. Indeed, when Gingrich rode into power on the back of the so-called "Republican Revolution" in the aftermath of the 1994 congressional elections he promised, with great fanfare, that the public would be able to get "direct access" to the workings of Congress through the newly developed Library of Congress THOMAS system. Though THOMAS has steadily improved over these four years, with vital and important information being made available, it comes no where near containing the full workings of Congress. Simple example: to this day you cannot search for the complete voting record of any particular member of Congress. There's no technological reason for this; it's all political. Members of Congress don't want their votes within easy reach of the public, plain and simple. "Pathetic." That's the word Gary Ruskin, director of the Congressional Accountability Project, uses to describe Gingrich's track record when it comes to shepherding congressional documents online. "The Speaker is quick to put documents on the Internet that serve his political ends and he is loath to put on the Internet the working documents of our congress," Ruskin says, "probably because he is afraid of the political implications of the public finding all those enormous favors his committee chairs do for corporate and wealthy special interests." Arrogance of Ignorance ======================= Anyone who has worked on a web site knows you can't simply "put something on the Internet." Yet this is exactly the sentiment portrayed by Gingrich, as if he could simply throw the Starr report at the web and it would "stick." There are a host of unanswered questions and technological hurdles to jump. There are plans to put the report on the House web site, but what format will the report take online? Will there be dozens of Hill staffers up all night crunching HTML code as they down Domino's pizza? Will the report be in searchable form? Documents on congressional web sites are notoriously devoid of such features. For example, when the House Commerce Committee put tens of thousands of internal documents gleaned from tobacco companies on the web they were all in graphics formats or required a special program, Adobe Acrobat, to read. The planned move to put the report on THOMAS is a good one. THOMAS has a great search engine, but THOMAS only takes documents that have been processed by the Government Printing Office, which means the entire report has to first be processed through that office. And what about all the supporting documents? The 455-page report is all well and good, but in order to get a complete-and I might add, unbiased-picture of the facts, the public should be able to read all the background testimony as well. Landmine alert ============== And then there is the sex. I guarantee that as soon as this report goes live on the Net the first thing a million or more people are going to do is crank the word "cigar" or the phrase "blow job" not to mention "semen stained dress" into a keyword search. (Big hint for you digital voyeurs: use the phrase "oral sex" or the more technical terms for that act, you'll likely have more success.) If, indeed, there is all manner of salacious testimony contained in the report, Congress immediately faces its own embarrassing scenario. For years now Congress has tried to place content restrictions on the Internet under the rubric of "protecting the children." Indeed, there is now a bill in Congress that would prohibit any material being placed online that could be deemed "harmful to minors." If the report contains any of the graphic sexual testimony that was reportedly given during the course of this investigation, it means that little Johnny or Janey are likely to get an immediate lesson in kinky side of sex if they happen to tap into the report. (The upside: such a search is likely to inspire some lively dinner table conversations.) Will Congress now be guilty of turning its own web site into a "red light district" as former Sen. James Exon, the father of the infamous Communications Decency Act, once feared the Net was becoming? Will Congress have to amend the current content restrictions bill to give itself a special exemption from prosecution under its own proposed law? Knowing this twisted Congress, that's exactly what they'll do. No big surprise. This is what happens when Congress does what it always does when it comes to the Internet: acts before it thinks. Meeks out...
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- IP: CWD--Net in "Starr" Role Dave Farber (Sep 10)