From Gary Rogers, Illinois, USA:

Dear Rod:

Thank you for your web site & information on H.R. 3783. The included letter was recently published in the Joliet IL Herald News as a guest column.

Dear Editor:

Recently, the Congress voted overwhelmingly to pass House Bill 3494, as part of the larger appropriations bill, which is now awaiting a Presidential signature. The bill, which is designed to protect children from online predators, is slated to be challenged in court by the ACLU, and various civil liberty groups. My husband and I have experienced first hand why, though well intended, H.B 3494 necessitates a judicial challenge and review.

Last fall, on the word of a disgruntled neighbor who claimed that some internet postings that allegedly targeted their child stemmed from our residence, our local police department, state's attorney's office, and the FBI accessed nine months of our phone and internet service provider records. Additionally, an attempt was made to subpoena our ISP to discover the web sites we frequented, my husband was called in for questioning, two members of our family were summoned to appear before three separate grand juries, and ultimately, my husband was charged with two class B misdemeanor counts of transmitting obscene material over telephone lines.

In spite of having signed receipts and witness affidavits to confirm that my husband was out-of-state the week of the alleged postings, we have been unable to have the charges against him dismissed. Our suspicions, later confirmed by our internet service provider, was that our account had been accessed illegally. (By the way, we are computer neophytes and own no "stunt" software that can perform David Copperfield-like magic that would enable us to transmit postings "from afar").

To date, we have spent in excess of $10,000 of our own funds for my husband's legal defense. We anticipate that an additional $15,000-$20,000 will be needed for trial representation. Because our neighbor is a journalist, we have also been subjected to an inordinate amount of inflammatory pretrial publicity, which has included being smeared on national television, and viewing a transcript of my husband being named culpable before a house judiciary subcommittee on crime. The negative publicity, of course, has resulted in business losses for my husband, who had spent years marketing a reputable fund-raising firm for charitable organizations, schools and churches. He has been stigmatized by being associated with pedophiles and internet predators, who solicit children online. No one in our home, or visiting our home, is a child pornographer or child molester. In fact, none of us subjected to this investigation has a criminal record of any kind. I, an award-winning school teacher, had to hire my own attorney for two grand jury appearances and seek "immunity from prosecution". Our nephew, who was also called before a grand jury, is an honors student at DePaul University in Chicago.

In trying to to discover why this was happening to us, we learned that Congressman Jerry Weller (R-IL) had funneled federal funding in the form of local block grants to our area police departments and to the office of the Will County State,s Attorney for the establishment of an "internet task force." We have contacted the Justice Department, who oversees the task force, to relate our story. We have also contacted both state and federal officials, and have received support from various due process and internet privacy groups, who are closely monitoring this case's motions and judicial rulings, and have offered us public awareness assistance.

It is understandable that no citizen, politician, or president wants to come out against legislation that favors child protection, but even I, a teacher supremely interested in safeguarding my students from harm, know that the legal ramifications of passing this type of legislation are far-reaching. The judicial implications for "deputizing" internet service providers so that they may serve as "censor monitors" for law enforcement officials is very Orwellian. Additionally, by trying to "localize" the internet and establish state-wide ordinances regarding what is "acceptable", "decent" or "obscene" on a mode of communication that is without parameters or boundaries may not be the best use of taxpayer dollars. Also, establishing irrefutable legal proof of a internet crime when it is possible to use e-mail or internet accounts illegally or fraudulently, or when users themselves can masquerade their identities, ages, etc. (as law enforcement officials themselves sometimes do online) is clearly a misguided effort if no eyewitnesses are present to actually view a transmission.

In our case, of course, my husband and I intend to appeal any conviction. We also have spoken to a half a dozen attorneys who all say that we have more than ample grounds to pursue a future malicious prosecution suit. It is a shame that local and state funds that could have been allocated for true law enforcement needs may end up being paid out in future court settlements over the efforts to prosecute these types of cases.

Sincerely yours,
Colleen M. Rogers

via eMail

Additionally, you may want to look at the attached link which was published in the Sunday, November 29(, 1998) edition of the Chicago Sun-Times.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/stevens/mich29.html

Sincerely,
Gary Rogers


EDITOR'S NOTE: Gary Rogers goes to trial again on 28 April, 1999.

More Kudos for POWERSSOUND...

Dear sir,I was very pleased to read your review on my album "Another me'

thank you
Amina Figarova


BOB POWERS RESPONDS: Dear Amina,

It's somewhat rare that a critic gets a bouquet from an artist, so I wanted to express my appreciation. Your album is a delight: outstanding piano work, unusual voice, good tunes, excellent arrangements. What more could anyone ask? Because I receive a half-dozen or so new releases every week, it's sometimes difficult to play a CD more than twice. That hasn't been the case with "Another Me," which is my stack of oft-played favorites. My only regret is that your voice isn't heard on more tracks. I appreciate your taking time to send me a note.

I've been writing about music much longer than you've been alive. I joined the staff of a small weekly newspaper in Florence, Kentucky, exactly 43 years ago. My newspaper career came to a climax with my appointment as entertainment editor of The Columbus Dispatch in Ohio. I have been a freelance writer since 1983. Unfortunately I don't get to concentrate solely on music. To make a living, I also write and report for a rubber industry trade weekly, distributed internationally, do book reviews for two print newspapers and six Web sites, and recently started as a copy editor for a computer-oriented collection of Web sites. Next month I begin my tour of duty as a columnist for the Web magazine, "All About Jazz," which you can locate at http://www.visionx.com/jazz/ .

Thanks and Have a Wonderful Holiday,
Bob Powers

Chuck Nyren, G21 Alumnus, Still Gets Fan Mail...

what a great bucolic slice of life-- or muffin, as it were! Having waged the war of rats while living in L.A. (which I still do) it made me laugh to think that one might have qualms about squashing them..... even as the possums and baby raccoons turn up during the year--and idiotically enough, one finds them.. ssoooooo cute. Human perfidy. ah well. just wanted to say I enjoyed Chuck Nyren's stuff! :)

We Love Introducing New Writers! Give us a shot.

i really enjoy your site. i'm a writer and i do a lot of satire and humor pieces. are you interested in submissions? if so, what's the procedure? please let me know either way, and keep up the good work!

thanks a lot,
katie


ROD RESPONDS: Our Guidelines are in the mail. Look forward to seeing your work.

Whoops!... Guess we let our Freak Flag fly again...

DEAR Butterfly dreamer, "There you go again" to quote a lover of all that is wealthy, american and globaly corporate, bashing , no,no cruise missle pinpoint targeting a major destructive and inherent evil of the very Net you have so intelligently advanced to the masses. Yes you said it all baby. They, like any slumlords, have only one concern about your and my neighborhood- how much of it do they own and control market share of period or rather, bottomline. Sure they'll whitewash afew buildings, God , they'll actually hire a few of the locals to do the work ,to show their corprate largesse, but we know who gets the largest. the teams of cigarette company defense fund lawyers will come in and deftly explain with a mix of Aristotelian Logic,sleight of hand, and varied andvague prevarificacious argument that it was actually the rain forests fault for being directly in The path of world progress ,the progress such as it is having no where else toturn. Here have another cigarette, they're good for you ,if you don't know anything about Them. Ahh ignorance is bliss, and control over the ignorant is twice bliss.

Love always and peace of the Master be yours in Christmas and always, your bro
eugene v. debs


ROD RESPONDS: So, you're like saying you liked the piece, right?


From Rico, Austin, TX, USA:

The Globalization and Democracy rant is the best thing you've written in ages. Won't do a fucking thing for you or me, but, amen, brother. One stone at a time and the water in the well will eventually get to the light.


ROD RESPONDS: (Huge Blush) I don't know what came over me. I mean, I was planning to write about how much I love Great Big Shopping Malls. The Devil made me do it.

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