USA

SOPA, PIPA and ACTA are worldwide moves to censor the internet. They come under the guise of fighting piracy and enforcing intellectual property. In reality, these bills are a push by large corporations to protect their profits and outdated business models.

Without a free and open internet, our ability to share knowledge would be severely restricted.

Just because these may be foreign laws, don't think that they won't affect us. America's laws are beginning to extend worldwide.

Consider these cases:

1. Even if your company or organization is not based in the US, your website could be targeted as a US domestic site if it was registered or assigned by a US-based registrar. This would be the case with .com and .org domains.
2. Recently, a judge in the United Kingdom ruled that a British student accused of running a file-sharing site could be extradited to the US, despite never having been to America or using US-based servers.

You can find more information at following sites:

• http://fightforthefuture.org
• Say NO to ACTA video on YouTube
• Reddit's technical examination of SOPA and PROTECT IP
• http://americancensorship.org
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Learn_more
• The Definitive Post On Why SOPA And Protect IP Are Bad, Bad Ideas

“The dirty secret of this day and age is that political gain and media ratings all too often bloom on fresh graves.”

-Charlton Heston

The Tucson shooting in which six people were killed and 13 injured, has tragically proven Charlton Heston's point once again. As soon as the news hit, politicians and journalists quite predictably piled in to offer what was mostly bumper sticker logic. Some were so keen to proclaim their outrage that they didn't bother to check their facts. MSNBC, for example, ran a piece with the well-known political commentator Rachel Maddow acerbically railing against pro-firearms advocates.

Unfortunately for the audience, most of what she was spouting was complete nonsense. Should it be legal for citizens to own the dreaded all-plastic undetectable Glock, she asked? In fact, such a gun does not exist outside of Hollywood movie scripts. The media is fond of portraying crazy gun-loving nutjobs as the source for these mass killings but might they also be part of the problem?

Republican Congressman Ron Paul seemed to be the sole voice of sanity.

While our Philippine lawmen are busy trying to restrict the freedoms of ordinary Filipinos, the Americans are steadily strengthening the rights of their citizens.

On May 20, the Service Member Second Amendment Protection Act of 2010 was enacted to the United States Senate. The bill protects the rights of Armed Forces and Department of Defense civilian employees by prohibiting any requirement to register privately owned firearms.

This ruling follows on from a wave of pro-firearms laws in the USA such as:

• the overturning of Washington DC's ban on handguns
• allowing concealed firearms carry in national parks
• expanding the lawful use of deadly force in self-defense
• Right-to-Carry reform and the growing number of "Shall-issue" states

Legislators in the US are realizing that gun control, just like alcohol prohibition, does more harm than good. How long will it take before those in the Philippines come to their senses?