There Will Be No Crackdown. (And What To Do If There Is One): "Thus, Bradley Smith is pushing the truth a long way when he says that the judge is pushing the FEC to start going after every single link in every blog directing to a candidate's website. Whether or not that is the case is up to Mr. Smith and his cohorts, not Judge Kollar-Kotelly. I think it is highly unlikely that the FEC is going to come up with a huge scheme to monitor blogs for links to a candidate's web pages. The FEC could create a definition of 'general public political advertising' that would only include obvious canned political ads provided by the candidate or third party which linked to a candidate's website. Mere advocacy and linking would not count as advertising. This would not prevent bloggers from advocating for whomever they wanted.
So then why did Smith attempt to paint his hands as tied in this matter? Simple--he wanted to discredit the McCain-Feingold bill as a whole. If he can get left-wing bloggers to start up a 'united front' with the rest of the denizens of the Internet, pressure might build for the repeal of the law."
different voices
10 years ago