November 23, 2013 11:57 AM
Action Outside of Washington
Here is an observation from a column by Mathew Dowd that seems to be right on point.“Leadership in the future is going to come more and more from outside Washington. Folks in communities around the country are finding solutions and building consensus in their neighborhoods. And as each day goes forward with DC in dysfunction, the federal government is going to become more and more irrelevant to their lives. And the leaders of tomorrow are going to emerge from towns and cities out in America where with limited time and resources they are getting the job done. We don’t need term limits because folks are just going to tune out leaders in DC more and more.” [10/11/13]
The failure of legislators in Washington to strengthen personal privacy laws has led to a variety of State legislatures taking action on their own.
Texas now requires a warrant for email searches.
Oklahoma passed legislation to protect the privacy of student data.
California has passed 3 online privacy bills this year. One, giving students the right to erase social media posts, and another making it a misdemeanor to post identifiable nude pictures with the subject’s person, and a third relating to “do not track” signals.
Montana now requires a search warrant before police can track a suspect’s whereabouts through cellphone records.
8 States have passed laws limiting the use of drones.
10 States have passed laws “restricting employers from demanding access to their employee’s social media accounts.” [NYT 10/10/13]
