For example: (D-Calif.) along with 14 more of Washington's finest are sponsoring a to be called The Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act. This bill was first proposed a year ago and many of us hoped it would just quietly wither and die. No such luck.

The bill (which, in a curious departure from normal sound bite politicking, does not have a cute or pithy acronym) seeks to criminalize electronic bullying.

UCLA School of Law professor sums it up this way in his : "Whoever transmits in interstate or foreign commerce any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated and hostile behavior, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both."

In this bill the term "communication" is defined as "the electronic transmission, between or among points specified by the user, of information of the user's choosing, without change in the form or content of the information as sent and received". And "electronic means" is articulated as "any equipment dependent on electrical power to access an information service, including e-mail, instant messaging, blogs, Web sites, telephones and text messages." That's rather all encompassing, don't you think?