Blogger day at Investors Business Daily

The 06 APR IBD (if you aren’t a subscriber, you are loosing $$$) had two great, quick articles on blogging; one on milbloggers and the other on the editorial page about the San Francisco Board of Moonbats is going after bloggers.

I think you have to be a subscriber, but the links to both articles are in the above paragraph. Let’s start with Doug Tsuruoka’s article Soldier Blogs Give Inside View of Conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan.

Question: What does a soldier do when the Army slaps a 45 mph speed limit on U.S. convoys in Iraq?

Answer: Gripe about it in a battlefield blog.

That's what "Michael," did in his March 17 Web journal entry from deep inside Iraq:

……posted on his adayinIraq.com blog. Michael identifies himself as a soldier in the 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, out of Fort Benning, Ga. In e-mails with this reporter, he says he must remain anonymous.

Mmmmmm, sounds familiar.

"I love the Army and our great country more than most and believe in everything we are doing over here. If I criticize some of the inevitable dumb things that are done in any bureaucracy like the army, it is to vent and have a little fun, nothing more."

The venting thing is critical, I think, for many Milbloggers. Great therapy for me.

"My guess is blogs - like every type of new media used by soldiers, sailors and airmen - already are (looked at carefully) by the Department of Defense," said Christopher Michel, chief executive of Military Advantage, a commercial Web site geared to members of the military and their families. "Like a lot of communications, blogs can cut both ways. The DOD's main concern is that they don't compromise security.

I think we do a lot better than the press.

"The next news breakthrough in Iraq could be covered by a soldier in the field writing a blog rather than a journalist."

Could be? Hey, already done multiple time over.

Another worry is that some people might intentionally use blogs to give inaccurate information about the morale or behavior of U.S. troops.

How we self police ourselves……woe be to a “Milblogger” that goes Moonbat on us. It is very impressive how self-correcting Milbloggers are.

Some say soldier blogs perform a valuable public service.

"Blogging troops are not getting paid to 'spin' the war. Nor are they worried about losing ad revenue if they tell it like it is," said Jock Gill, a former "new media" adviser to President Clinton.

Hey, hey! Stop the presses! We have a Clinton official that gets it. Quick, get that man to Hillary 2008. Wait, don’t. Send pictures of him in a banana hammock to Wonkette instead. Jock, one way or another, well done.

Overall, a solid article. It goes into much more detail than above on security issues an motivations.

The second article, A Chill In The Air, from the Editorial Page is a great warning call about the danger posed to blogs by those that cannot stand freedom of speech.

Freedom Of Speech: Rhetorical attacks against blogs have turned into real attacks that may curb free dissemination of information. What of the First Amendment?

The latest assault comes from San Francisco, where the board of supervisors announced last week that it will vote on a city ordinance … (that) … will require San Francisco's bloggers to register with the city's ethics commission and report all blog-related costs over $1,000 in a calendar year.

But that's not all. According to San Francisco city attorney Chad Jacobs, bloggers who write about candidates running for local offices will be have to pay a registration fee if hits on their Web sites exceed 500. Violators will also be subject to Web site traffic audits.

See where unalloyed Leftism always leads? Choking all dissent; stifling all freedoms. That is from the self-appointed “tolerant” examples to us all. That is in the U.S.A. Interesting that the serfs in the Bay area are letting this go by, but slaves rarely rise up until it is too late.

This naked aggression follows a chilling rule from the federal bench. Last fall, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ruled that the federal campaign finance law covers the blogosphere. She expects the Federal Elections Commission to enforce her decision….

Yep, we talked about that before.

….- even though the panel voted (4-2 three years ago) that the shameful McCain-Feingold campaign finance law does not apply to blogs.

Fortunately, that's not the end of the story. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has introduced legislation to nullify the court ruling. While he deserves credit for this, he's partly to blame for government attacks on free speech getting as far as they have. He was one of the many supporters of McCain-Feingold.

Oh, can we pick on Canada again? Yipee!!!!

Canada has banned a U.S. blog for its coverage of Canadian political scandals. The Captain's Quarters blog is famously guilty of raising the ire of a panel looking into government corruption merely because it posted testimony from the panel's inquiry and promised readers it would follow up with more news.

What's worse, any Canadian blogger who links to the Captain's Quarters' post apparently is subject to state retribution. The one Canadian blogger who did could be charged with contempt.

Harumph. More slaves. Cold slaves, but slaves none-the-less. You get the government you vote in, I guess.

We're not surprised. Unlike mainstream media, many bloggers aren't just mouthpieces for big government. Their very existence is dangerous to the current arrangement, so they must be harassed out of existence or regulated into servility.

In this war, the death of free speech is just collateral damage.

That last quote is why I subscribe to IBD. Not only has CANSLIM made my future retirement and children’s inheritance look better, the editorial page keeps me sane.