Hey Maggie, go find an issue you can actually do something about! ACLU Update Below
This morning I wasn’t too terribly shocked to see that Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks is threatening to pull $7.5 Million out of our public libraries because people can see pornography or other “inappropriate” information on public library computers. Don’t get me wrong, I think protecting children from porno on the web is an important and valid issue, but I simply don’t believe threatening to take 3/4 of the Monroe County Library is a productive solution… to the contrary, I don’t believe there is much of a solution (short of having big brother watching your every click).
Maggie, I don’t know if you are very familiar with the way computers work or not, but have you ever noticed when your anti-virus program updates itself? Have you ever heard of software updates? Ever read about virus taking something like yahoo out for a few hours? The coding of computers and the constantly changing slang of the Internet is such that there will ALWAYS be loopholes, and thus preventing children from seeing pornography is always going to be a game of cat and mouse. Time and time and time and time again this has been demonstrated. You can reduce the likelyhood of children being exposed to pornography by using filter software, however the libraries are already doing that (By the way that’s funded with federal dollars as mandated in the Children’s Internet Protection Act of 2001). I hate to say it, but there is no instant solution you can threaten the libraries into coming up with.
As our County Executive, I wish you would study the issue rather than just firing off a knee jerk threat to the library’s budget. Study the issue a little.
Why don’t you do something productive like funding “The Children’s Agenda” rather than closing the door on the public? Fighting an unwinnable morality fight to score some political points… how very Republican of you.
———————-UPDATE———————-
Beats the crap outta the post I was gonna write.
Me too. Great post!
Well written J. Big Kudos! Maggies’ rash decision is definitely politically motivated in order to boost her slumping popularity.
What gets me is how fast the library scrambled to accomodate the local politico. Are you going to trust this library director and board of directors to protect your privacy if the feds give them a shove. Hey, blow on them, just a little, they apparently will collapse so fast your head will spin. Makes me sad.
It is difficult to bite the hand that feeds you or in this case gives you 75% of your budget..
Thanks… She’s clearly put herself into a losing situation… Either she’s going to push a plan that’s going to waste money and not work (and get sued by the ACLU), or she’ll have to back off and continual to look uninformed and unrealistic.
Just in time for the 2007 campaign season, a proven “scare and distract” issue guaranteed to divert public attention from real issues, like Republican corruption, and gin up the crazy-right base.
Yep. Maybe she is looking to take the 7.5 million as another 1-shot budget gap closure.
Great post
She’s a poser, for sure. What hasn’t been followed through on, in the media, is that the library system needs MORE money to stay on top of this, not LESS!! I am on our local library board and, as with most public boards in NYS, we are constantly scrambling just to keep a roof over the shelves. This woman needs to be gone.
Semirelated… I wonder if we’ll be deemed “inappropriate” under her new plan… we’ll see
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