Obama Regime Gives Away the Internet

by Dave Blount | March 17, 2014 3:11 pm

Back in 2008, even those who refrained from drinking the Kool-Aid had no idea how bad it would be. Some said electing Barack Obama would be like giving the disastrous Jimmy Carter a second term. But Obama is no Jimmy Carter. Under Carter, the Russians only invaded the ungovernable wasteland of Afghanistan. Under Obama, they are annexing the precious Crimea. Carter gave away the Panama Canal. That was bad enough, but Obama is giving away the Internet:

U.S. officials announced plans Friday to relinquish federal government control over the administration of the Internet, a move that pleased international critics but alarmed some business leaders and others who rely on the smooth functioning of the Web. …

The change would end the long-running contract between the Commerce Department and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a California-based nonprofit group. …

“We look forward to ICANN convening stakeholders across the global Internet community to craft an appropriate transition plan,” Lawrence E. Strickling, assistant secretary of commerce for communications and information, said in a statement.

Americans outside the Obama Regime look forward to this with far less enthusiasm. The Internet is open and free primarily because it was developed and has been overseen by the USA. Relinquishing control could put it under the direct control of the United Nations.

Among the many downsides are security issues and an Internet tax:

“U.S. management of the internet has been exemplary and there is no reason to give this away – especially in return for nothing,” former Bush administration State Department senior advisor Christian Whiton told The Daily Caller. …

“While the Obama administration says it is merely removing federal oversight of a non-profit, we should assume ICANN would end up as part of the United Nations,” Whiton said. “If the U.N. gains control what amounts to the directory and traffic signals of the Internet, it can impose whatever taxes it likes. It likely would start with a tax on registering domains and expand from there.”

An Internet tax that would be used to finance this pernicious cabal of kooks and dictators isn’t even the worst of it.

The greater danger posed by the giveaway lies with the security of the Internet itself. While the U.S. has never used ICANN in a war or crisis situation, the potential exists for it to obstruct Internet commerce or deter foreign cyber attacks — powerful tools in the globalized information age.

After numerous recent widespread and successful cyber attacks against the U.S. have already been linked to emerging world powers like China, it isn’t difficult to image a future scenario in which management of ICANN could help ensure intellectual property, economic, national and international security.

“Under invariably incompetent U.N. control, it could mean a hostile foreign power disabling the Internet for us,” Whiton said.

Being incompetent is possibly the closest thing the United Nations has to a redeeming quality, considering that it is generally hostile to American interests, despite being largely funded with our money.

Then there is the issue of content. The UN will go to the last extreme to promote socialism, Islam, the global warming hoax, and transnational wealth redistribution from relatively free countries to miserable dictatorships. Any site not on board with this malignant agenda could find access blocked to the information highway.

Turning over ICANN to the “international community” is likely to destroy the Internet as anything but a propaganda tool for supranational tyrants — which makes you wonder why the Obama Regime didn’t pull something like this years ago.

On tips from William Wilson and Stormfax. Hat tip: Reclaiming Common Sense. Cross-posted at Moonbattery.