Internet Censorship: SOPA Shelved Until ‘consensus’ is Found … PIPA still Has Vote on January 24th

It’s a start, but none of us should get a warm fuzzy until a stake is put through the heart of SOPA and PIPA.

The Internet can claim a victory, but do not get out the champagne and party favors just yet. As reported at The Hill, House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) said early Saturday that Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) promised him the House will not vote on the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) unless there is consensus on the bill.

“While I remain concerned about Senate action on the Protect IP Act, I am confident that flawed legislation will not be taken up by this House,” Issa said in a statement.  “Majority Leader Cantor has assured me that we will continue to work to address outstanding concerns and work to build consensus prior to any anti-piracy legislation coming before the House for a vote.”

The announcement comes just hours after Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), SOPA’s sponsor, made a major concession to the bill’s critics by agreeing to drop a controversial provision that would have required Internet service providers to block infringing websites.

However, Issa said that even without the site-blocking provision, the bill is “fundamentally flawed.”

All should watch the following VIDEO from the Cynical Brit … makes a lot of sense and should scare the Hell out of you!

Six Republican Senators have come forward to ask Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to postpone the vote on PIPA; however, Independent socialist Senator has responded that the vote should go ahead as planned.

Late today came word that six Republican senators have asked Majority Leader Harry Reid to postpone a vote on Pro IP, also known as PIPA. The senators wrote: “Prior to committee action, some members expressed substantive concerns about the bill, and there was a commitment to resolve them prior to floor consideration.”

For those of you who do not know what SOPA and PIPA is, please familiarize yourself. It impacts all that use the Internet from bloggers to Facebook, from Google to YouTube.  These two bills are supposed to prevent on-line piracy; however, like ever poorly written bill, its the law of unintended circumstances that all that currently use the Internet can already see. Do we really want Congress to pass another bill into law where it has to be passed so that we can see whats in it? Bad legislation is bad legislation. It should cause pause for all, no matter if they are on the LEFT, RIGHT or CENTER, when a government looks to restrict Freedom of Speech under the guise of a piracy bill.  This is one issue where we can all come together and “JUST SAY NO” to SOPA and PIPA!

Did Congress actually think they were going to slip such a bill that would affect so many under the cloak of darkness? Shame on all of you who backed, supported and sponsored this bill. Many of which who are in complete retreat due to the backlash of “We the People”.

Reddit and maybe Wikipedia was supposed to go “dark” for 12 hours on January 18 to protest SOPA.  Maybe they will still do so to protest PIPA.  Imagine if YouTube, Facebook and Google went dark to protest as well? Maybe that is what it will take for law makers to realize that writing BS bills will not be tolerated.