Al Gore may not have invented the internet, but his government is responsible for managing it! For more than 20 years, a little-known nonprofit called ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has been at the controls of the web’s domain and IP addresses. Overseen by the Commerce Department, this private west coast office has been an international hub for maintaining one of the most important aspects of the internet.

That’s about to change, according to the Obama administration. Larry Strickling, U.S. government’s assistant secretary for communications and information has announced that the government is moving the American-controlled internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions to the global ICANN. As one tech expert said, “That sentence may not mean a whole lot to many people, but this move is of huge global significance in how the internet is managed and governed.” By letting go of this contract, there’s a very real fear that the U.S. is giving up its stake of control in how the web functions. Much of that responsibility lies with the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), which is a global group that keeps the web, as Ed Vaizey writes, “from being controlled by one organization, or dominated by a few special interests.”

But that doesn’t mean there aren’t problems. In a global neighborhood, there are always going to be countries who disagree with the U.S. on fundamental values like religious liberty or free speech. And in recent years, some of those nations have lobbied to put the internet under U.N. control. Before the president hands over the keys to the U.N. or anyone else, Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) are doing everything they can to stop him. Both chairmen expressed their concern in a pointed letter to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), calling the idea of an “internet hand-off” “misguided or, at the very least, premature.”

Despite the administration’s guarantees, the frustrated duo write, “under the current proposal, the power of foreign governments would be significantly increased.” Senator Cruz agrees, and sounded the alarm in a speech to the Heritage Foundation this summer. “Right now, the Obama administration’s proposal to give away the internet is an extraordinary threat to our freedom, and its’ one that many Americans don’t know anything about.” Just think about what countries like China, Russia, or Iran would do with their hands on the world’s most powerful communication tool. Not onlyk would they censor speech (as they’ve done in their own nations), but others would use this newfound power to eradicate so-called “hate speech,” a term — he warned — with a definition that “can be very, very malleable.” “We are facing a very real possibility of speech being censored in the name of ‘hate speech.’ It is hate to express a view different from whatever the prevailing orthodoxy of the government is.”

And that isn’t just Senator Cruz’s view. It’s the admission of Larry Strickling himself. In a hearing Wednesday, Senator Cruz asked point blank what this move would mean for the future of American freedom. “Just to clarify your answer to the question, if the [internet] transition goes forward… the U.S. would be on the very same footing as would Russia or Iran or China?” Stricking replied, “That’s correct.” Then the Texas senator turned to ICANN CEO Goran Marby. “Is ICANN bound by the First Amendment?” he asked. “To my understanding,” Marby said, “no.”

More than 100 conservative leaders are trying to fight the administration’s outrageous internet giveaway. The Conservative Action Project (of which FRC is a part) has been fierce in its opposition, explaining in a Memo to the Movement that “Perhaps none of Mr. Obama’s actions during his two terms will do as irreparable damage to our national security as his transferring the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority functions to the foreign government-controlled [ICANN].” Desperate to derail the move, Senator Cruz has introduced a bill called the Protecting Internet Freedom Act, aimed at stopping the NTIA from letting the key contracts expire. “It will also,” the group reminds people, “ensure that the United States maintains sole ownership of the .gov and .mil top-level domains, which are vital to national security.” Obviously, the internet doesn’t belong to America. But America plays a crucial role in ensuring that it’s an avenue for human rights, free speech, and transparency. Help us keep it that way! Contact your senators and ask them to support the Protecting Internet Freedom Act today!

Originally published here.

A Good Manning Is Hard to Find

Want better health care? Commit treason. That strategy seems to have worked for disgraced U.S. soldier Chelsea Manning. The former Army private, who’s currently serving a 35-year prison term for passing more than 700,000 classified documents to WikiLeaks, claimed victory this week after the Army finally caved to his demands for a taxpayer-funded sex change.

Manning, who was on a hunger strike to pressure U.S. officials, ended his stunt this week in celebration. “I am unendingly relieved that the military is finally doing the right thing. I applaud them for that.” If the military had done the right thing, it would have exacted a far harsher penalty on Manning than 35 years in prison — not rewarded him for putting countless innocent lives at risk. Since 2013, when he officially changed his name to Chelsea, Manning has fought to put taxpayers on the hook for his transgenderism.

Now, three years later, it seems the Army is more than willing to cater to the traitor’s whims, including footing the bill for thousands of dollars in radical hormone therapy and surgery. Not surprisingly, there’s no shortage of outrage over Manning’s special treatment — from taxpayers to our troops. While thousands of honorable veterans suffer serial abandonment in VA clinics across the country, the Obama administration is rewarding an avowed traitor with expensive — and elective — treatment. It’s a sad commentary on this administration when an act of sedition entitles you to better care than most of the men and women who have honorably served this country!

Imagine what the heroes of 200 years of war would think now, when their commander-in-chief’s greatest priority isn’t buying parts for worn-down airplanes and tanks but guaranteeing veterans gender reassignment surgery. Wounded veterans are literally dying for proper medical attention while President Obama is busy financing his agenda of gender anarchy. Apparently, putting American lives at risk — like Manning has done — entitles you to better treatment than people with actual combat disabilities. That’s the Obama military: distinguished veterans die while dishonorable traitors get sex changes. If you want a snapshot of this administration’s priorities, that’s it.

Originally published here.

An Uncivil Engineer

There may be people who think religious liberty and sexual freedom can co-exist. But the president’s chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights certainly isn’t one of them. In a scathing rebuke of the country’s most basic constitutional rights, Martin Castro just released a report that drops the mask on the administration’s phony defense of the First Amendment. The document was called “Peaceful Coexistance: Reconciling Nondiscrimination Principles with Civil Liberties,” but a more appropriate title may have been “How to Pretend You Care about Religious Liberty While Simultaneously Dismantling It with Inflamed Rhetoric.”

Among some of the harshest criticism of America’s core values, Castro wrote, “The phrases ‘religious liberty’ and ‘religious freedom’ will stand for nothing except hypocrisy so long as they remain code words for discrimination, intolerance, racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia, Christian supremacy or any form of intolerance.” Religious liberty, he insisted, “was never intended to give one religion dominion over other religions, or a veto power over the civil rights and civil liberties of others. However, today, as in the past, religion is being used as both a weapon and a shield by those seeking to deny others equality.”

William McGurn, writing for the Wall Street Journal, couldn’t contain his astonishment. “He confirms that the progressive argument is mostly about insulting Americans with differing views.” He’s right. This report is undisguised bigotry in and of itself — against people of faith. Suggesting that he knows the motivations of people of faith by calling their religion “code” for discrimination is beyond the pale. How do the authors know what Americans believe? Have they interviewed them for this report? It’s people like Castro who are the cowards, judging people of faith who they have never met and hiding behind the veneer of their report. If they had a shred of courage, they’d be honest and interact with the people of faith they judge. But seeing the humanity of the other side might prevent them from reaching the biased conclusions they want to reach.

Nevertheless, people of faith, acting in love but not afraid of such hostile actors as these, won’t be cowed by these assertions. As McGurn says, we’re all better off for seeing this report. “The solitary virtue of Mr. Castro’s presentation is that he makes not the least effort to hide the ugly bits.” Hopefully, U.S. voters will recognize them for exactly that and elect a candidate with a greater affection for the Bill of Rights than this administration has shown.

Originally published here.