Tech | December 20, 2011 | 4 comments

SOPA: Mark Up To Continue Tomorrow Dec. 21 at At 9:00 a.m. !

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Dagum
Special session of the House Judiciary Committee meets to mark-up SOPA and ram it out of committee, while opposition Congressman are on vacation.

Last week, the House Judiciary Committee held a markup on H.R.3261, the Stop Online Piracy Act or “SOPA,” a bill to address the problems of online copyright and trademark infringement. The controversial nature of the legislation is reflected by the fact that Members offered more than 55 amendments to the legislation, and the markup could not be completed as scheduled. The Committee has announced that the markup will resume on December 21.

Stealing music, movies, and other forms of copyrighted materials is wrong, and the problem of online infringement is real. But the bill is not an appropriate solution. It’s a blunderbuss rather than a more narrowly tailored response, and its stiff penalties would pose a significant risk to legitimate websites and services. It would undermine the openness and free exchange of information at the heart of the Internet. And it would violate the First Amendment.

A key provision of the bill would give copyright owners the power to stop online advertisers and credit card processors from doing business with a website, merely by filing a unilateral notice that the site is “dedicated to the theft of U.S. property” – even if no court has actually found that infringement has occurred. The immunity provisions in the bill create an overwhelming incentive for advertisers and payment processors to comply with such a request upon receipt. Courts have always treated such cutoffs of revenue as a suppression of speech, and the silencing of expression in the absence of judicial review is a classic prior restraint forbidden by the First Amendment.

Moreover, the bill’s definition of a site “dedicated to” theft is vague and subjective, in violation of longstanding constitutional precedent that rules regulating speech must give clear notice of what they prohibit. The ambiguous definition will impermissibly chill protected communication....


Continued at:

http://bostinno.com/2011/12/20/sopa-will-kill-the-internet/
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4 comments // SOPA: Mark Up To Continue Tomorrow Dec. 21 at At 9:00 a.m. !

  • corderodedios
    • 0
      corderodedios  
    • "Opposition" Congressmen? They cannot be considered "opposition" if they are too limp to do their job. But they're not. They're not "opposition." They're in favor of it but are too weak and flaccid to put their real positions on the record.

    • 5 months ago
  • Dagum
    • +2
      Dagum  
    • The shill and leader of the Pro-SOPA faction is the Chairman of House Judiciary Committee, Republican Lamar Smith. Ironically, the opposition leader of the Anti-SOPA faction within the committee is fellow Republican Darrell E. Issa(who happens to be an engineer.)

      Here is the Official House schedule.

      http://www.house.gov/legislative/date/2011-12-21

      Lamar Smith is trying every trick he can, to get SOPA out of committee. It looks like Darrell Issa and many other congressman from the opposition have left congress for holiday vacation right now. So Lamar Smith will be able to ram it out of committee tomorrow.

      Once it gets out onto the floor it will be impossible to stop. If SOPA is going to be stopped it has to be stopped in Committee. Call the congressman of the House Judiciary committee and tell them to vote against it!

    • 5 months ago
  • Dagum
    • +2
      Dagum  
    • Dagum:

      The members of the House Judiciary Committee by rank.

      Chairman:
      Lamar Smith (R) Texas, 21st district
      Washington, DC Office Phone: 202-225-4236

      Ranking Member:
      John Conyers jr. (D) Michigan, 14th district
      Washington, DC Office Phone: 202-225-5126

      Jim Sensenbrenner, (R)Wisconsin 5th
      DC Office Phone: 202- 225-5101

      Howard Berman, (D) California 28th
      DC Phone: 202-225-4695

      Howard Coble, (R) North Carolina 6th
      Phone: 202- 225-3065

      Jerrold Nadler, (D) New York, 8th
      202- 225-5635.

      Elton Gallegly, (R) California, 24th
      202- 225-5811

      Bobby Scott, (D) Virginia, 3rd
      202- 225-8351

      Bob Goodlatte, (R) Virginia, 6th
      202- 225-5431

      Mel Watt, (D) North Carolina, 12th
      202- 225-1510

      Dan Lungren, (R) California, 3rd
      202-225-5716

      Zoe Lofgren, (D) California, 16th
      202- 225-3072

      Steve Chabot, (R) Ohio, 1st
      202- 225-2216

      Sheila Jackson-Lee, (D) Texas, 18th
      202-225-3816

      Darrell Issa, (R) California, 49th
      202-225-3906

      Maxine Waters, (D) California, 35th
      202- 225-2201

      Mike Pence, (R) Indiana, 6th
      202- 225-3021

      Steve Cohen, (D) Tennessee, 9th
      202-225-3265

      Randy Forbes, (R) Virginia, 4th
      202- 225-6365

      Hank Johnson, (D) Georgia, 4th
      202- 225-1605

      Steve King, (R) Iowa, 5th
      202-.225-4426

      Pedro Pierluisi, (D) Puerto Rico, Resident Commissioner
      202- 225-2615

      Trent Franks, (R) Arizona, 2nd
      202-225-4576

      Michael Quigley,(D) Illinois, 5th
      202-225-4061

      Louie Gohmert, (R) Texas, 1st
      202- 225-3035

      Judy Chu, (D) California, 32nd
      202- 225-5464

      Jim Jordan, (R) Ohio, 4th
      202- 225-2676

      Ted Deutch, (D) Florida, 19th
      202-225-3001

      Ted Poe, (R) Texas, 2nd
      202- 225-6565

      Linda Sánchez, (D) California, 39th
      202-225-6676

      Jason Chaffetz, (R) Utah, 3rd
      202-225-7751

      Jared Polis, (D) Colorado, 2nd
      202- 225-2161

      Timothy Griffin, (R) Arkansas, 2nd
      202- 225-2506

      Tom Marino, (R) Pennsylvania, 10th
      202- 225-3731

      Trey Gowdy, (R) South Carolina, 4th
      202--225-6030

      Dennis A. Ross, (R) Florida, 12th
      202- 225-1252

      Sandy Adams, (R) Florida, 24th
      202- 225-2706

      Ben Quayle, (R) Arizona, 3rd
      202-225-3361

      Mark Amodei, (R) Nevada, 2nd
      202-225-6155

      Call them and tell them to vote "no" and kill SOPA in the committee.

    • 5 months ago
  • MotherForTruth
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