What Will They Think of Next?

The following is an excerpt from the November 2, 1999, edition of Liberator OnLine, provided by the Advocates for Self-Government. Folks, this just serves to illustrate that there is no end to the police-state ideas put forth by the ruling bureaucrats in Washington. What did we expect? Create a bunch of regulators, and they are going to regulate (or, in more plain English--they are going to control us).

Washington Goes To Mr. Smith

Leo Smith is a living example of how some "campaign reform" efforts can throttle free speech.

Last year Smith added a section to his business Web site. The new section called for the defeat of Rep. Nancy Johnson of Connecticut,his Congressional representative. Smith spent no money on the
addition, just his time, since he was already paying for the Web site.

However, shortly after the election, Smith was told by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) that, because of his use of his Web site in the campaign, he was in violation of federal campaign law. His crime? According to the FEC, by using his Web page as he did, he had spent more than $250 in expressing his political views, without disclosing his identity and filing the reports with the federal government that such campaign donations require.

Smith was shocked. By his reckoning, he hadn't spent $250. In fact, he hadn't spent a dime on the site - just his time. However, the FEC said it determines the value of Web sites by counting, among other factors, the cost of the computer hardware and software used to create the site. If a computer cost more than $250, the FEC said, its owner would have to meet the filing and disclosure requirements of federal law.

The ACLU points out that, using that logic, if the computer cost more than $1,000, its owner would have to register as a political action committee (PAC).

"Forget about free speech," Smith told the ACLU in an interview. "If you can't advocate what you want for an election, that strikes at the heart of our democracy."

Smith in essence has told the FEC to stuff it.

"I told them that I was definitely not going to take my site down, I was not going to file the reports and I was not going to post my name on the site," he said. "I told them that from a free speech
standpoint, they were totally out of line."

The FEC in turn has informed him he faces possible legal action.

"Leo Smith's story proves our fundamental point: you cannot divide money and speech," says Laura W. Murphy, Director of the ACLU's Washington National Office. "To argue otherwise, is to ignore reality. The Internet allows anyone with a phone line, as the Supreme Court said, to become a 'town crier with a voice that resonates further than it could from any soapbox.' Congress must act to ensure that the FEC does not gag the new town criers."

Smith's story has provoked some members of Congress to offer legislation that would exempt political speech on the Internet by individual citizens from regulation by the federal government.

But why just the Internet? Why should citizens - no matter what media or form of expression they choose to use -- be limited or severely burdened regarding how they can spend their own money to express their political opinions?

(Source: ACLU press release / Thanks to Richard Tomasso)
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Fed Official: Put Tracking Devices In US Bills

A Federal Reserve official says that tracking devices should be added
to US bills.

It's all for our own good, of course.

Marvin Goodfriend, a senior vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, proposes that a magnetic strip be placed on US currency.

"The magnetic strip could visibly record when a bill was last withdrawn from the banking system," Goodfriend said in a paper presented at a recent Federal Reserve System conference in Vermont.

By using the information on the magnetic strip, what Goodfriend calls "a carry tax" could be imposed on people who don't handle their money the way the government thinks they should. The "carry tax could be deducted from each bill upon deposit according to how long the bill was in circulation," Goodfriend says.

The longer you hold onto your money without putting it into a bank, the less the money would be worth. In essence, it's a tax on storing dollar bills outside of government institutions.

Or, as Wired News puts it, "greenbacks will get automatic expiration dates."

What's the point? Goodfriend says this will discourage hoarding (after all, we can't just let people stuff their money into mattresses instead of using banks), fight the Drug War and other black market
activities, and give the government a powerful new tool it can use to battle deflation.

Goodfriend says the Federal Reserve already has technology to make the proposal entirely feasible (though he refused to give details on that technology, according to Wired News).

"Systems would have to be put in place at banks and automatic teller machines to read bills, assess the carry tax, and stamp the bills 'current,'" he writes.

Congress would have to pass legislation allowing such a tax. No such legislation has been introduced... yet.

Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas), who serves on the House Banking committee, expressed outrage at the scheme.

"The whole idea is preposterous," Paul said. "The notion that we're going to tax somebody because they decide to be frugal and hold a couple of dollars is economic planning at its worst."

Such a program would give government virtually total control over the economy and over every American's income.

One can only speculate what other uses such a magnetic strip might be put to - especially in conjunction with "Know Your Customer"-type financial spying legislation...

(Source: Wired News: "Cash and the 'Carry Tax'" by Declan McCullagh, Oct. 27)

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The Late "Moderate"

Obituaries are describing the late Republican Sen. John Chafee of Rhode Island as a "moderate." Oh, really? In 1992 Chafee introduced legislation to completely outlaw the private possession of handguns. All Americans would have been ordered to turn over their handguns to the government. Anyone subsequently found with a handgun would have faced up to $5,000 in fines and five years in prison.

When Chafee introduced this legislation, he acknowledged there were about 66 million handgun owners. About one in four US households had one or more handguns. Almost none of these owners used their guns in any criminal activity. Yet Chafee would have made them turn in their guns or become instant felons, to be hunted down by a Gun Gestapo and punished with severe fines and lengthy imprisonment. Given that so many Americans passionately support their Second Amendment right to own handguns, one shudders to imagine the consequences of a government attempt at mass confiscation.

Furthermore, a large and impressive body of scholarly research - most notably that of John Lott of the University of Chicago - indicates that private firearm possession is a major crime deterrent. Thus
Chafee's legislation would have left millions of Americans exposed to criminal predators, and would have unquestionably driven up the numbers of robberies, murders, and rapes nationwide.

This was police-state legislation, and it would have required a police state to enforce it. A person who could seriously propose such a thing might deservedly be called many names, but "moderate" is not one of them.

(Sources: Associated Press, Gun Owners of American, Independence Institute)