Out of control

In his last comment about whether blogging is an ephemeral phenomenon or whether it's here to stay, wafflestomper, a regular WS commenter, made an interesting point, almost in passing, about "over-controlling governments" staying out of the net. His point was that blogging will remain popular, if outside forces, especially the government, don’t stifle the web with regulation.

Knowing stomper is a conservative, this drips with loaded meaning for me -- but when it comes to the internet (and media in general), I definitely agree.

It's too bad then, that the consensus in both parties seems to be for more censorship across the board. The Republicans want to tell me what my morality ought to be, and they want to keep smut away from my children -- regardless of how I decide to raise them or what I consider smut.

Partly because most vocal Hollywood personalities happen to be of a different political persuasion than Republicans, partly because of their fundamentalist Christian supporters, and partly because they've got bugs up their asses, Republicans are constantly decrying the evils of Hollywood. They'd have us believe that every movie portraying a criminal in anything but a damning light is a threat to the fiber of American morality and culture. We've already heard some GOP-ers readily support putting restrictions on similar types of content (or worse – porn!) found on the net.

And in a disturbing turn, the Democrats seem to agree. Lately DLC bloggers like Ed Kilgore and Bull Moose have been singing the praises of "economic progressives" who are also "social conservatives" – what Bull Moose calls "progressive traditionalists". They believe that in order to get in touch with Red America, Dems are going to have to get more socially conservative – starting with supporting the war in Iraq, and then clinging despererately to phrases like "marriage is between a man and a woman" and then supporting initiatives which would finally put a muzzle on Hollywood.

Take, for example, this Kilgore line I’ve been stewing over for the past two and a half months:

[Some Democrats claim] that any effort to promote some self-regulation of entertainment products amounts to censorship or even repression, as though the utterances of Paris Hilton, as opposed to those of Joe Camel, merit judicial protection.

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Promote self-regulation? What exactly does that entail? – yelling at Hollywood until every film they release doesn't disgust Bill O'Reilly? That will be very effective, I'm sure. Then all us Dems can lie in our beds with calm hearts that we've satisfied the repressed Right, and now maybe some of them will vote for our side. Funny how "promoting self-regulation" often very quickly turns into just "regulation".

By the way, Joe Camel is a cartoon character who sells cigarettes to children, while Paris Hilton is an flesh-and-blood American citizen. So yes, I would argue that Paris Hilton’s utterances merit judicial protection, whereas Joe Camel's do not.

Used to be, the DLC promoted economic moderacy and social progressiveness. They believed in fiscal responsibility, business and global trade, but also in traditional Democratic social values, such as making education better and easier to obtain, equality for minorities, the strong separation of Church and State, and an unwavering defense of the First Amendment – Joe Lieberman nonwithstanding. Has the DLC finally transformed then into just another group of moderate Republicans?

I hope not. The "Democratic Wing" is no better. They’d censor the Fox News Channel if they got the chance.

Is this what America wants then? While all of us have found something distasteful on our radios, TVs or internet, are we all really so horrified that we are willing to smother our own creativity and slow the pace of technological advancement with government regulation?

And why is it so hard to find a "progressive realist?" socially progressive, economically moderate. Am I the only one?