Free Speech and the Internet I. Bush = Big Brother The Bush administration's assault on privacy rights never ends. In one of the most chilling news stories I have read in some time, the Bush team has subpoenaed Google to find out details on what users type into the search engine. This specific subpoena isn't terribily controversial. It concerns whether laws regarding child pornography work to prevent access. The problem is that if Google releases search engine details now, a terrible precedent will be established for future privacy intrusions. Worse, the Bush legal team is predictably asking for much more information than needed for the case. The Attorney General has requested 1 million randomly selected Web addresses from various Google databases. This information will provide a massive amount of data that the government can study for various purposes. The discovery of popular search terms, for instance, could be used to increase the visibility of right-wing propaganda on the internet. Searches for anti-Republican party news could lead to the creation on FBI files on law-abiding Americans. (This website has likely led to the creation of a file on me.) If Google must release these records, where does it end? Once it is established that the government may discover Google's records relating to criminal prosecutions, anything and everything on Google becomes fair game for government intrusion. II. Self-Censorship I mention self-censorship in order to highlight the challenges that people already face when it comes to free speech on the internet. Allowing the government intimate access to minute details of web surfing provides another, but totally unavoidable, barrier to free speech. The biggest challenge that I face in blogging is that everything I post here will remain viewable to the public for the rest of my life. My goal is to become a Public Defender, hopefully here in San Francisco. This goal creates problems for me because I, on several occassions, have refrained from criticism of those in San Francisco politics for fear of repercussions down the road. Further, organizations that I am currently affiliated with could punish me for criticism I hurl towards them on this blog. I don't think these limits that I've placed on my blogging are a good thing. My freedom of speech has already been slightly muted for fear of personal loss. To be fair and honest, I must at least inform my readers of this quandry. When it comes to national politics, I never hold anything back. I have no desire of attaining any national prominence nor do I have any fear or regrets about anything I've ever said. When it comes to local politics, I have held back on occassion. The scope of this blog is much larger than issues in little old San Francisco, so I don't think this is a huge harm. Still, I think it's more important to write the truth than withhold criticism for personal fear. As such, I have decided to stop self-censorship of local politics. The only self-censorship I impose is with regards to organizations that I am a member. But let me get my message out on a particular issue, even if I cannot divulge the full scope of the facts. I attend law school at night as part of a larger evening program. Many of the students in this program with me attend school at night because we have to work during the day to support ourselves. Government loans don't even pay our entire tuition, so the system has been gamed in such a way as to make it virtually impossible for the poor to attain Master's Degrees of any sort. This is one of the key methods of entrenched privilege holding others out so that they can benefit for themselves. If the government would allow greater amounts for loans, I could quit my day job and devote myself to law school in the way that my comparatively wealthy peers can. Most law schools do not offer night classes. This is another way of furthering the goal of keeping the rich wealthy and the poor in their place. Because of this disgusting reality, I am grateful to USF for providing a night program. However, our school does a poor job of meeting the needs of night students. Few classes are provided at night so our quality of education pales in comparison to that offered to day students. Nearly all groups at school hold all meetings in the middle of the day. As such, poor working students like me are excluded from these groups while rich trust fund kids get the experience and the access. The school takes no effort whatsoever to pressure these groups into ending the exclusion of working students from these groups. Grants for public interest work are only issued to those who are a member of a group that steadfastly refuses to meet in the evening. Another group carelessly scheduled an important event on a Friday without any consideration of the effect of such a change on working students. Our Student Bar Association exclusively holds massive student get-togethers during the working day. As a result of this disregard for poor students, I have less chance of getting a job as students with worse grades but more time to participate in extra curricular activities. I doubt much of this interests many of you, but I decided to end part of my self-censorship and none of this really warrants its own post. I think it's worthwhile to remember that there is a concerted effort in America to create enough hurdles so as to make the "rags to riches" dream a myth. The rich stay rich because they have all the advantages; the poor stay poor because we get screwed every step of the way. I believe it's a crime against humanity to artificially limit the amount of loans people receive for education. Rich kids don't need loans so this doesn't change their situation, but it's helping keep poor people like me down. Loans are just that -- loans. If I want to get into more debt so that I can improve my education, the government should let me. The government, however, feels that it's more important to give massive tax cuts to the mega-rich and give corporate welfare to Halliburton than it is to temporarily lend me some money to improve my standing as a citizen. America is no meritocracy and my law school experience is a case in point. People with wealth and access rise to the top; intelligence and hard work isn't nearly as important.