Personally I think spammers should be killed by having their servers 
inserted where the sun doesn't shine.  But then I get 2-3 pieces of it
a day..
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             CNET Features - How To - Can the government stop spam?
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 With the recent surge in Internet usage, more and more people are
 complaining about spam--and it seems legislators are finally trying
 to do something about it. There are several bills in the works that
 supposedly strike back against unsolicited commercial email. However,
 some of these bills were written with the approval of direct
 marketers. Before writing to your representative or senator, be sure
 you know which bill is which.
 Existing laws
 The so-called junk fax law--Title 47, Chapter 5, Subchapter II of the
 United States Code--prohibits sending unsolicited faxes and making
 uninvited phone calls using a prerecorded voice. Although some
 antispam activists have tried to apply Title 47 to email, the
 congressional intent behind the law clearly does not include
 computers, and the legislation has never been used successfully
 against spammers.
 Some Internet users, among them a group of technology workers known
 as CAUCE (Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email), want to
 amend Title 47 so it specifically includes computers and computer
 networks. While the call for an amendment has not resulted in any
 proposed legislation, it has alerted members of Congress to the
 problem, and now several antispam bills are pending.
 New bills
 On May 22, 1997, Rep. Chris Smith (R-New Jersey) introduced a bill
 (H.R. 1748) that would make it illegal to send unsolicited commercial
 announcements via email, unless the recipient already had a business
 relationship with the sender. Moreover, the legislation would outlaw
 using fake return addresses in commercial messages, and would allow
 spam victims to recover damages at a minimum of $500 per message.
 This is the bill that CAUCE and nearly all other antispam activists
 support.
 Around the same time the Smith bill was introduced, several competing
 bills were proposed. None of these bills would actually do much to
 eliminate spam, and some of them were actually drafted with help from
 mass marketers.
 Sen. Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) introduced a bill (S. 771) that would
 force all spam to contain the word advertisement in a header. This
 would help users who know how to use filters. But the Murkowski bill
 would also force ISPs to create their own antispam filters and to
 offer them as part of their Internet access services. Not
 surprisingly, ISPs don't like this option, because it places the
 financial responsibility for dealing with spam on them instead of on
 spammers.
 Even weaker bills have been introduced by Sen. Robert Torricelli
 (D-New Jersey) and Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-Louisiana). The Torricelli
 bill (S. 875) was drafted with help from the Direct Marketing
 Association and states that mass email is an "important mechanism"
 for reaching online customers, language that antispam organizations
 take as a justification for spam. Plus, this bill appears to
 criminalize all forms of anonymous online activity--even
 participation in chat sessions--and could place restrictions on
 unsolicited email that doesn't carry a commercial message.
 The Tauzin bill (H.R. 2368) is even worse. It would create a panel of
 representatives from the Internet community (including direct
 marketers), who would in turn create some voluntary recommendations
 for direct marketing. Most antispam activists vigorously oppose the
 Murkowski, Torricelli, and Tauzin bills.
 Will legislation work?
 The Smith bill may still be weakened by lobbying from the direct mail
 industry, as happened earlier this year with a Nevada state antispam
 law. However, CAUCE is staying in close contact with Smith to try to
 make certain the bill remains true to its original intent.
 Even if the Smith bill passes in its current form, though, there are
 loopholes. Scott Mueller, who sits on the board of CAUCE, explains:
 "There are two things [the bill] clearly doesn't cover: anyone
 spamming for noncommercial purposes, such as political or religious
 messages...and if the messages genuinely originate outside the U.S."
 So, spammers who move overseas can send all the junk email they want,
 even to addresses in the United States.
 But Mueller doubts that many mass emailers will move. After all, most
 unsolicited commercial email advertises a local service, and most
 countries lack the plentiful bandwidth of the United States. As for
 spammers disguising commercial appeals in religious or political
 terms, Mueller says, "You can get around almost anything if you try
 hard enough, but we think [the bill] will deter the majority. I'm
 willing to accept a 95 percent reduction. I want to see the growth
 [of the spam industry] stopped."
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