said by Jonbo298 :

I know it may not happen in my lifetime but I hope China gets what they deserve and actually allows people to express what they want without fear of death or whatnot.

But I can see why the ISP's have to bow to the pressure. Its either lose your money flow completely or bow into the pressure. Wait..that sounds familiar...our own politician's

said by fuziwuzi :

Yes, though not by "force of law", the political pressure in our own country to conform is still very palpable. Just ask the Dixie Chicks.

said by djrobx :

If it were people chosing the boycott the Dixie Chicks it wouldn't be a problem. But in their case, Clear Channel "silenced" them, which demonstrated the power Clear Channel really has on our purported "free speech". So I do see it as a very apropos analogy.

said by rradina :

I wouldn't waste your time defending the U.S. If Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Iranian President) can come to this country and deny WWII, can anyone honestly argue that we don't have free speech?

said by rradina :

They see this guy as someone who is with them because of mutual opposition.

said by pnh102 :

The only thing that disturbs me about Ahmadinejad's speech is that so many people at Columbia agreed with what he said... indicating this by "thunderous applause."

That is very sickening.

said by ackman :

Relative to the quality of leader of the country where he was speaking, the audience saw him as an improvement.

said by pnh102 :

I'd gladly pay for a one way ticket to Iran for each one of those ingrates. That audience is so stuck up, it has no idea what living in a truly oppressive country is like.

How is it even possible to compare a country like the USA, where anyone can criticize the government, to a country like Iran, where criticizing the government will have you meet up with the business end of a noose?

said by ackman :

...So, criticize the government? Yeah, I'll criticize the simpleton in the White House...

said by ackman :

That door was opened in the USA with the end of habeus corpus, and the opening of CIA torture camps in Poland.

said by ackman :

People like to say that liberals must HATE America.

said by ackman :

No, liberals love America the same as the in-the-closet conservatives.

said by ackman :

The liberals just think anything worth having is worth fighting for and seeking to improve.

said by ackman :

Conservatives are afraid of liberals because they fear change, which is the very definition of conservativism.

said by ackman :

I personally find it funny that the conservative attack machine is still labeling democrats as "tax and spend" democrats, and they're going to take all your money with higher taxes.

said by ackman :

Usually what happens is we get sick of the damaging economic policies of the conservatives, so we vote in democrats, who HAVE to raise taxes to dig us back out of the hole.

said by ackman :

I can't even begin to address each point you made because each is so inane in its own narrow-minded way.

said by pnh102 :

I know you can't. It is because my points are absolute truth.

said by ackman :

Yep, you and Bill O'Reilly have a lock on absolute truth. All else is bullcrap.

said by djrobx :

Clear Channel "silenced" them.

said by pnh102 :

Wow, post #2 and the USA already "sucks."

I might be out of it. Please tell me when the Dixie Chicks were killed, imprisoned, tortured or otherwise had their freedom deprived for expressing their views?

People choosing to boycott the Dixie Chicks is not the same as the government depriving you of your freedom for voicing opposition to government policy.

But this is still the USA, right? Are we no longer free to boycott businesses or acts that we don't like?

said by ackman :

Wow, pretty out of touch with the nature of the problem. Take a look at how many stations and markets Clear Channel controls. It's all about monopolistic control of content.

said by ackman :

The outcry about the speaking engagement mostly came from conservatives, who are deathly afraid of free speech and real democracy.

said by pnh102 :

Completely and totally wrong. Clear Channel doesn't hold a gun to anyone's head as a means to force people to listen to its programming. Even if Clear Channel owns all the radio stations in town, there is nothing stopping someone from listening to satellite radio, MP3 players, their own CDs or any other source of content that they happen to own.
Which is reasonable because Columbia doesn't support free speech. How can Columbia make the claim that it supports free speech when they told the ROTC and the leader of the Minutemen to go stuff it, while they would give a forum to Ahmedinijad and Hitler?

said by PDXPLT :

If they had said what they did at a concert in San Antonio or Houston I would be the first to applaud them for speaking out. But saying it in London, where they knew they'd be guaranteed approval from the crowd, was nothing but cowardly.

said by KrK :

The Dixie Chicks, spoke their minds... and they were crucified for it.

said by fuziwuzi :

I see many of you have, quite unknowingly perhaps, proven my point.

said by moonpuppy :

....that host trojans, spyware, open mail servers, etc?

said by ackman :

Because it's not a government regulation. But I'm sure the free market will take care of doing what you suggest.

said by ackman :

But the afraid-of-change conservatives believe that the consumers would speak with their wallets, which would force the companies to fight back against spam, spyware, trojans, etc. Medicare works pretty well for the older folks. Social Security works pretty well, when the Republicans aren't stealing from it. The VA worked pretty well, until president moron started cutting its funding in 2000, then overwhelmed it with casualties. Police and fire service are government institutions. Ensuring you don't crap your pants from bacteria-laced water is the responsibility of government, and they do a pretty good job of it.

It's a talking point to say government can't do anything well. Reagan started that whole lie, because he was tired of getting his wealthy Hollywood actor income taxed at a higher rate. The net result was unchecked national foreign debt.

said by MrMoody :

quote:

---

The government recently launched a program whereby two animated characters (Jingjing and Chacha, above) remind users they're being watched.

---

But why are they surfing on manhole covers?

said by ender7074 :

Just to get started here, anything the NY Times says is suspect but assuming there's even a kernel of truth here, how is China's government implementation of technology the fault of American companies? I mean, camon. Get off the blame America train here. A firewall is just a firewall and tracking systems are just that. The end user decides if the use will be beneficial or tyranical. In China's case there is no question. But I guess its just another case of "everything is America's fault", right?

said by Somnambul33t :

when is china going to enter the 21st century?