On August 3rd the Hotline reported the results of a new poll that showed
that a clear majority of the public (65 percent) believes that the government's
antitrust case against Microsoft is "politically motivated by competitors"
and that roughly twice as many voters would be less likely (33 percent), rather
than more likely (17 percent), to vote for a politician who supports the
government suit.
When the Supreme Court struck down the Communications Decency Act, cyberlibertarians breathed a sigh of relief. But keeping government out of the censorship business may not be enough to assure freedom online -- censorship may now be privatized.
The near-comic conclusion of the Wen Ho Lee case splattered more than enough egg to cover the faces of much of Washington. It's a media story, a federal law enforcement story, a civil liberties story, perhaps even a discrimination story. But more than anything else, the Lee case and its awkward denouement are, or should be, a political story.
Speaking to a German radio interviewer last July, Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui sparked a diplomatic fire storm with three seemingly innocuous words: Taiwan, he announced, would henceforth treat contacts with mainland China as "state-to-state" relations.
