Murkowski anti-spam bill could be a problem for ISPs

Fri May 30 19:14:06 UTC 1997

The real problem here is one of Internet competency(as usual).  

This is a case of politicians trying to legislate something they don't
fully understand, unfortunately this happens all the time (Thank you,
Mr. Exon).  At this point we (being system/routing administrators) need
to take time out of our already full schedules to help these "people in
power" understand all of the interdependencies inherent to the processes
used to complete any mail transaction on the Internet.  Nobody needs to
be told that legislating something they don't understand will result in
bad, unclear and quasi-interpretive laws.

Correct me if I'm wrong but the Internet, specifically the client
interaction, is built to allow the client to be in control of the
information they receive??  The realization that comes to mind is;
Doesn't the responsibility of information consumption rely more squarely
on the shoulders of one who can more immediately affect what he or her
sees and not on the provider of the information?

Attacking from a different point....

Hasn't the United Stated Government overcome it's ego and realized that
trying to legislate a global entity is futile??

But then again, I'm not a politician....or a lobbyist for that matter...

John McCann
Router Flunkie
GST Internet 
jmccann at gstis.net