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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Outside Voices: Facebook’s about-face

Web site retracts privacy changes, but does it really matter?

Chicago Tribune, Feb. 20: Thousands of Facebook users threatened to un-friend the entire Web site last week to protest what one consumer guardian called “a digital rights grab.”

The Electronic Privacy Information Center and 25 other groups were poised to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission over revisions to the site’s contract with users when Facebook retracted the changes, saying it was all a misunderstanding.

A few weeks ago, Facebook quietly changed the fine print, deleting some language about removal of content by users and adding a clause about retaining it after an account is closed. It took a while for anyone to get around to scrutinizing the new wording, but eventually the Consumerist blog – run by the same group that publishes Consumer Reports – got ahold of it. Its take: “Anything you upload to Facebook can be used by Facebook in any way they deem fit, forever, no matter what you do later.”

Well, yikes.

Facebook insisted it wasn’t trying to assert ownership of data, which is still subject to individual users’ privacy settings. To quiet the backlash, though, Facebook agreed to go back to the original wording and invited users to help write a bill of rights and responsibilities to govern privacy issues.

It was encouraging to witness a victory for consumer vigilance. But we couldn’t help but be amused that so many people were alarmed by the real or imagined breach of their online privacy, and we’re not just talking about Facebook.

You don’t have to be promiscuous about social networking to embarrass yourself online. Go ahead: Google your friends, your co-workers, yourself. If you cringe at the mug shot that accompanied your bio on the Class of 1988 20th reunion program, just be grateful you aren’t half-naked and balancing a beer on your head in that photo, especially if you’re in the middle of a job search.

Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Feb. 26: The D.C. House Voting Rights Act under debate in the U.S. Senate violates the Constitution. Period. And any member who votes to approve it violates an oath of office to protect and defend the nation’s founding document.

Should the 600,000 residents of the District of Columbia have a voting voice in the Congress? Of course they should; it’s only fair. But how they achieve that representation is crucially important.

The very founders who were adamant against the notion of taxation without representation outlined the process by which D.C. residents might achieve that representation – by amending the Constitution, not by passing a law.

The problem in the bill doesn’t end there. The act includes a provision to add another congressional seat for Utah.

What does awarding an additional seat in the House to any state have to do with ensuring voting rights in D.C.?

The Constitution is clear on the process of apportionment. It’s done every 10 years, after a census reveals growth among each state’s population. Utah has argued that it got cheated when the last census came up about 850 people short of adding another seat, yet didn’t count between 11,000 and 14,000 Mormon missionaries who are state residents but working overseas.

If this act passes – and odds are it will, given its smooth ride through the House – the final judgment undoubtedly will come in the courts.

The Supreme Court is the final arbiter of all things constitutional.

The justices need to be brushing up on Article 1, Sections 2 and 8.

Kansas City Star, Feb. 23: Hey, it’s hard work fulminating in Washington about executive perks and pay.

Members of Congress have spent hours expressing outrage over CEOs’ outlandish salaries, bonuses and trips. And getting the stimulus bill passed was a long, hard slog.

So who is to fault some lawmakers for using the winter recess as an opportunity to get out of Dodge?

Lots of people. More so than in most years, the overseas journeys popular among members of Congress are raising eyebrows at home.

Politicians should have seen the backlash coming. Americans are worried about their finances and the nation’s economy. They’re postponing purchases and putting vacation plans on hold. And the federal deficit is exploding.

This would have been a good year for elected representatives to stay home and show solidarity with constituents.

Some did. But plenty set off on trips paid for either by U.S. taxpayers or by sponsors.

In normal times, these trips could perhaps be defended as educational and good for international relations.

But these times are anything but normal. Members of Congress shouldn’t be surprised if constituents resent them for treading too close to the behavior for which they so roundly criticized corporate executives.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Feb. 25: Conservative commentators – Rush Limbaugh, Lou Dobbs and Glenn Beck among them – have been railing against a provision in the federal stimulus bill that funds research into how well medical treatments actually work and distributes the results to doctors and patients.

Limbaugh warns darkly that comparing the effectiveness of health treatments really is just the first step toward health care rationing and government-controlled medicine.

Never mind that health care already is rationed in the United States on the basis of price. Never mind that knowing the utility of goods and services offered for sale is the cornerstone of free-market economics, essential to determining their value. Never mind that the rationing assertion is borrowed wholesale from a flawed analysis by Betsy McCaughey, a former Republican lieutenant governor of New York, who works for a think tank funded in part by the drug industry.

So who would oppose improving health quality and reducing waste? Some drug and medical device makers worry that testing will show their ultra-expensive new products aren’t much better or any better than existing alternatives.

And then there are politicians and pundits with nothing to offer but bankrupt ideas and no way to sell them but fear itself.