Wow. I’m glad Mr. Durden did a ‘quick skim” of the bill and jumped to conclusions. Nothing like reading the index of a book to really get to the meat and potatoes. We have some pretty heavy confirmation bias playing everyone as paranoid fools with this type of reporting.
If you look at the actual meat of Title V in the bill it does nothing but call for appropriations that fund highly paid people to turn over rocks and report on the latest and greatest efforts of the Russian government to influence information in the US. Big deal. I don’t see any authority to take actions, shut down web sites, or levy fines to counter “propoganda”. It’s the government funding programs and delegating those tasks to already existing agencies, nothing more.
Let it be writ large that from now on that everyone in the US take the most extreme view possible regarding all news stories. Everyone is your enemy. Live paranoid, and take everything that conforms to your beliefs as truth, and all other information a lie.
I’ve seen more bad information coming out of Zero Hedge than good where financial recommendations are concerned, and this post is no different. If, over the course of the last two years, I had acted on their projections on the economy and bailed, I would have lost quite a bit of money, because they’ve been flat wrong.
I see zero hedge as a silent version of Glenn Beck. Everything they print conforms to the dark, negative view they have of the world. Yes, there are scary things out their, and if you want to go hide under a rock, fine, but leave me out of it.
The government isn’t coming to take away your half-ass website, Tyler. Next time you might want to read the book, rather than the back cover, before pulling the fire alarm.
Maybe not (?) but this is what I saw under Title V, Section 501 (e) Duties:
The duties of the committee established by subsection (b) shall be as follows:
(1) To counter active measures by Russia to exert covert influence, including by exposing falsehoods, agents of influence, corruption, human rights abuses, terrorism, and assassinations carried out by the security services or political elites of the Russian Federation or their proxies.
(2) Such other duties as the President may designate for purposes of this section.
Hmmm, doesn't "counter active measures by Russia" sound like actions, and more than just turning over rocks and reporting what they found? Also seems to leave the door wide open to whatever penalties the President would like to add on top.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for limiting Russian influence over ANYTHING going on in the US. But I also don't think the Drudge Report, and many other independent journalists who print stories contrary to the MSM are all doing it at the behest of Russia, as the Washington Post and others have been claiming.
I think maybe you should read it more carefully.