Both sides agree -- blogosphere got this one wrong

Did you know the federal government wants to spread its propaganda – the same stuff used to play mind games with Middle East nations – on the Internet for American consumption?

Well, not really. But the blogosphere sure seems to think so.

According to the Pew Research Center, bloggers from both the right and left launched into furious condemnations of House passage of an amendment intended to modernize rules surrounding the dissemination of government information.

What followed on the blogs was a series of references to Orwellian policies, 1984, Big Brother, Pentagon bashing, and Obama-related conspiracy theories.

On the other hand, what would you think of legislation that received rare bipartisan support in the House and is simultaneously backed by the Heritage Foundation and the ACLU?

It turns out that the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act is simply that – an attempt to modernize the rules for government dissemination of information in the social media age. The goal is greater government transparency.

The folks at Heritage and the ACLU said online opposition to the bill was based on misinformation, beginning with a blog on BuzzFeed. 

(Mac Thornberry)

On Capitol Hill, the reaction to the reaction was more blunt. Rep. Mac Thornberry, a Texas Republican who co-sponsored the amendment, belittled the blogosphere in an interview with Foreign Policy magazine.

"To me, it's a fascinating case study in how one blogger was pretty sloppy, not understanding the issue, and then it got picked up by Politico's Playbook, and you had one level of sloppiness on top of another,” the congressman said. “And once something sensational gets out there, it just spreads like wildfire."

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