A new bill being proposed in the senate will give Obama special powers to "safeguard" public and private networks and entities from a cyber attack.From The Hill:
The president would have the power to safeguard essential federal and private Web resources under draft Senate cybersecurity legislation.
According to an aide familiar with the proposal, the bill includes a mandate for federal agencies to prepare emergency response plans in the event of a massive, nationwide cyberattack.
The president would then have the ability to initiate those network contingency plans to ensure key federal or private services did not go offline during a cyberattack of unprecedented scope, the aide said....Further:
Additionally, it will "promote public awareness" of Internet security issues, while outlining key protections of Americans' civil liberties on the Web, the aide continued.
Privacy groups are nonetheless likely to take some umbrage at Rockefeller and Snowe's latest effort, an early draft of which leaked late last year.
When early reports predicted the cybersecurity measure would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity emergency," online privacy groups said they felt that would endow the White House with overly ambiguous and far-reaching powers to regulate the Internet.
When early reports predicted the cybersecurity measure would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity emergency," online privacy groups said they felt that would endow the White House with overly ambiguous and far-reaching powers to regulate the Internet.
The bill is sponsored by Olympia Snow, a RINO from Maine, and Jay Rockefeller, a Democrat from West Virginia. The main problem with the bill is that is gives powers, emergency powers for Obama to act on a perceived or real "cyber threat". According to Rockefeller, "Too much is at stake for us to pretend that today’s outdated cybersecurity policies are up to the task of protecting our nation and economic infrastructure," Rockefeller said. "We have to do better and that means it will take a level of coordination and sophistication to outmatch our adversaries and minimize this enormous threat." If that is the case, and it seems reasonable, why gives the powers to one person, the President, who at this time isn't someone I would trust with my 4 year old, let alone emergency powers over data and voice communications in this country. It's bad enough the NSA snoops every packet of information that traverses the public network. What more does he want?
Like all progressives, he wants evolutionary change in our government and society, which is that the government asserts more and more control over it's citizens in everything they do. To me, this opens a door that should remain shut, but we can blame Bush for opening the door with Echelon and it's subset Room 641A. Couple this with the patriot act and the proposed bill stated here, the government could do what it wants to anyone. Oops, it already can...
Why people find this acceptable is beyond me. We are evolving into a society of Obama's desires and yet we close our eyes to the closing walls.
Thank you for reading this blog.
2 comments:
not that I agree with the bill, but I ask you is there a better option? Should there be something?
I would not give the president sole discretion and power on this. We have the military, and may be as part of their job, they can do this. The other thing is, should the government be responsible for cyber security of private corporations? There's too much intermingling with government and private sector now, its becoming almost fascist. Lean on the side of liberty for our people, even it means we might get a little hurt, as opposed to regulating us to death to protect us from other and ourselves.
The more I read, the more I see, the more I am becoming a libertarian at heart, in the vein of Andrew Napolitano. The socons like Hannity will always say if they aren't doing anything wrong, why worry? Such conformism is short sighted at best.
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