Republican Staffer Khanna Axed Over Copyright Memo 506
Bob9113 writes "Ars Technica reports that Derek Khanna is getting axed over his memo detailing the conflict between laissez-faire-oriented free market ideals and the regulatory monopoly that is copyright. 'The Republican Study Committee, a caucus of Republicans in the House of Representatives, has told staffer Derek Khanna that he will be out of a job when Congress re-convenes in January. The incoming chairman of the RSC, Steve Scalise (R-LA) was approached by several Republican members of Congress who were upset about a memo Khanna wrote advocating reform of copyright law. They asked that Khanna not be retained, and Scalise agreed to their request.'"
He Should Be (Score:5, Funny)
Who in the adult world is surprised when a low level employee is canned for upstagin and blindsiding the higher up leadership??
This is not the least bit surprising and shocking. Anybody who does this in an other venue would have gotten the boot, and rightfully so.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know what he was thinking, but I think we all can correctly guess what he learned about Washington and politics in general.
It's an old boys' club, the yes man gets ahead, and messengers get shot when exposing contradictions.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't about the old boys club. If this had been just-another-report, they would not even have known he was involved. You can be 100% guaranteed that the 'representatives' who complained were NOT representing us. They were representing the RIAA. You can be sure that the RIAA gave these guys a call and explained in no uncertain terms that campaign contributions and getting re-elected hinged on certain.... favors.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Interesting)
To me this sort of behavior tells me all I need to know about those particular politicians. They are the type of leaders who would routinely quell dissent by denying reality and silencing sympathizers. More than a few US politicians have the same default policy toward climate change, the ring leader of that well-established group is Senator Inhofe.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
More importantly this lays bare the fact that there is now only one party in Washington D.C. and it suckles the teat of the highest bidder. Contrary to Rush Limbaugh and the bloated talking heads on either side of the aisle, there is no fundamental difference save the verbs in their patter. I'm betting you get the majority and minority whips to perform a live sex show on the Senate Floor if only Monsanto would sponsor it, and at least that would be an honest day's work for a whore. The Republicrats are for sale, and as such so is our Constitution, Civil Rights, Juris Prudence and the security of the Middle Class. Any sane act of remediation regarding our failing system of government or economics must first pass the test of whether or not its inconvenient to the wealthy and powerful. Which is why we have the best government money can buy,
Re: (Score:3)
Eh, I think I have enjoyed Genda's posts in the past, but AC is right here. There hasn't big a rift this wide between the two dominant American parties since the Civil War. Arguing that they are both the same because the parties still agree on a couple of issues? That really is moronic.
Here's a 30-second list of issues we can all agree the parties have significantly divergent policy approaches toward:
No contradiction. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't really think this is a contradiction. I think the reality of the party line is more "Corporations are people .. the only people." Less government, less taxes, less regulation, more rights. These apply to real people: corporations, not you or me.
Re:No contradiction. (Score:5, Insightful)
Real people to them are corporations and those stealing... Sorry. Making more than 250k/year are also people. Everyone else is a leach, even if they pay more in taxes than the so called real people.
There are people making multiple millions who pay exactly 0% in taxes. These are "job creators" but the numbers show that job creation is at an all time high when we tax these so called job creators significantly.
We need to stop letting them use the American population as a slave labor force, and stop letting them use the American wealth as their personal score cards between them. They create nothing, they provide nothing, they contribute nothing, we shouldn't give them such a disproportionately high percentage of the nations economic power.
I say we eat the rich and give the things they stole back to the people they stole it from.
Re: (Score:3)
You won't be able to eat the rich. The hookers std's and blow is likely to make their flesh at least somewhat toxic.
Re:No contradiction. (Score:4)
I say we eat the rich and give the things they stole back to the people they stole it from.
Vive La France!
Even though I like the idea of indiscriminately killing people much better off than myself, it is just plain a bad idea.
You really only need to kill a few of them, most of them are pretty good people.
Re: (Score:3)
Not really people EARNING $250k... EARNING MONEY IS SECOND CLASS.
Small business owners (plumbers, mechanics, doctors, lawyers, web designers) Ballplayers, music artists, book writers for example get "wages" (w-2, 1099, it's all the same) as income... Taxed at 28%. Our "47% are moochers" friend made his millions on carefully paid out capital gains... Taxed at 15% MAX. THAT is the problem. Even if YOU put your money in 401k it's still taxed as EARNED income..., while the money managers on Wall Street get pa
Re:No contradiction. (Score:5, Interesting)
Meanwhile, the world is in fact getting better. In the East, millions have been lifted from abject poverty to livable poverty, Europe has experienced a period of peace never before seen in its history, in the US, minorities gained a lot of rights and recognition, the Drug War seems to be fading a little. Wages didn't really grew, but a lot of stuff - particularly consumer electronics, but not only - that was only dreamed of a few years ago is now on the reach of the average person, and I could go on.
Yes, we're ruled by an oligarchy. So what else is new
Re: (Score:3)
I do work part time, Sherlock. Gives me more time to post on slashdot. I average about $850 USD/month but it varies somewhat. Once you get used to living on very little money it's really not that hard. To save you the trouble let me do the math for you. That is $212.50 per week or $10,200 USD/year. Of course it is just an average. And if you want to pick nits that is also take home pay. My gross pay would be about $13,260 before federal/state taxes according to my trusty HP48G.
Find me a full time job that p
Re:No contradiction. (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is not that America is bad at picking leaders... its that you have some strange illusion that you are picking a leader. The system is precisely designed to select someone who is capable of taking 'X' dollars to represent the person who gave him 'X' dollars. That would be by definition a political whore. The folks who applied for the job because they were intelligent, knowledgeable, skilled and passionate, got passed over for the one who knew when to bend over. So I'm saying that the vast majority of American's wouldn't know a great candidate if one fell of the sky and landed on them... but you can't blame them, most folks under 50 have never seen a great candidate and under the current systems, its no surprise.
Re: (Score:3)
This is partly why I've been intrigued by the recent Internet enabled trend of funding candidates $50 at a time. When Obama broke all the funding records in 2008, he had big donors that I'm sure expect something from him. However, most of the money was from people like me who didn't donate enough to deserve a thank you call from a staff member. Of course, the Supreme Court ruling that corporations and rich people can donate unlimited funds to super-pacs undid any good that could have come from that. I g
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
Scalise is one of my representatives, I actually kinda know the guy.
Dunno if a letter will help...but, I'll sure send one...this move sucks.
I don't think this is just a R problem...I think both R's and D's up there are so bought and paid for that no reform will likely happen that will benefit you and I, but I'll certainly send a letter about this....
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Funny)
I don't think this is just a R problem
It's not...Chris Dodd is a D(ouchebag)
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
No, this is not a party line problem at all. Both R's and D's voted for copyright extension, and I know the D's are at least as bad as the R's because so many of them also supported crap like SOPA.
Basically, it's whoever takes money from the [MP|RI|MAFI]AA is who votes in favor of copyright extension.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, just keeping track of who voted for bad things is hard enough. Keeping track of who is being hypocritical in Congress is a full-time job, best left to late-night-comedian-staff-writers. And it turns out that is pretty much non-partisan. The harder task is keeping track of those who occasionally aren't being disingenuous.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Interesting)
Too true.
Though I'd say the last part is manageable. They're the ones that sound really crazy, and aren't apologetic about it. I get the impression those ones really believe their own crazy-talk.
So your choices in politicians end up being "batshit crazy" or "shifty SOB liar".
Re:He Should Be (Score:4, Insightful)
So the GoP is coming across as being in favor of regulation that supports industry against citizens, but not regulation that supports citizens against industry.
The GOP is in favor of regulation that supports businesses against the citizen and
The GOP is in favor of deregulation that supports businesses against the citizen.
When GOP interests and the Democratic Party's interests align, the citizens generally get the short end of the stick.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
It's more of an R problem
Wow, somebody's not paying attention. Look, I know that on Slashdot it's hip to bash Republicans at every turn, but this is so wrong it's not even funny. Insane copyright laws is a bipartisan problem, but Democrats lead the charge. They're all in the pocket of Big Media in places like California and New York that lean heavily Democratic. Chris freaking DODD is running the MPAA now.
There are plenty of valid criticisms of the Republican party, and they're certainly not clean on this issue. But to say that they're worse than Democrats on copyright just sounds like uninformed Republican bashing.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the D's say business is evil and go around forcing government on everyone. Safe effect, though.
What I can't figure out is why no one seems to understand that big government at least as bad as big business, except it makes the rules and doesn't need to make money. They are both destroying the country.
Meanwhile, the D's are big friends with Hollywood, so I doubt they would take advantage of this issue. They don't want copyright reform any more than the R's do. The only people who do want it are non-politicians who actually understand what essentially-infinite copyright does.
Re: (Score:3)
Name some Democrats who are for abolishing copyrights and patents or at least idiotic software patents and ridiculously long copyright terms. Those are undeniably corporate interests You say the democrats are anti-corporation.
While we are at it name a single Democrat who supports abolishing Corporate limited liability, perhaps even corporations themselves. No more CEOs. Only owners. Owners who can be held fully responsible for the damage they cause in the world. I support all of these things. Do you think I
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Informative)
Here is just some of the significant government involvement that defines married people as different than single people. [wikipedia.org]
Of course gays want to get married.. look at how special married people are treated. They want to be treated special too, which is why allowing gay marriage isn't actually a fair outcome unless you define 'fair' to equal 'treating people differently.'
The fair outcome is only arrived at when the government gets the hell out of the institution of marriage.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm surprised by the number of posts that think this is kidding, trolling or outrageous. Just like soldiers, civil staff like this have an obligation to, while they're on duty, keep their professional, official standpoints impartial. Personal political views don't mesh with civil service. As agreeable as his point might be, it's unprofessional to do it while representing his job, and it's not the least bit surprising or wrong that said job dismisses him for officially disagreeing with where they stand.
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Interesting)
It wasn't just something he posted on his blog. His memo was approved by the committee. It just happened that the committee quickly retracted the memo after their true masters (their largest campaign contributors) expressed their disapproval.
Open Comment to Derek Khanna (Score:5, Insightful)
Dear Derek Khanna,
You have made more friends than enemies. You may have been canned today, but you could easily replace your boss. RUN FOR OFFICE!
Sincerely,
Someone who actually votes.
Derek Khanna - Geek (Score:5, Informative)
He is one of us - look at his linkedin profile
http://www.linkedin.com/in/derekkhanna [linkedin.com]
Unless, we stand up for him, no one else will ever dare write about copyright reform in the future.
This needs to be something like fight against SOPA.
Re:He Should Be .. .NOT (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:He Should Be (Score:5, Interesting)
The position paper was vetted internally and approved along the orgs normal channels. Unless by "higher up leadership" you mean the lobbyists -- they were surprised, that's true.
He worked an institution that was supposed to inform debate. He was canned because some debates are not allowed.
He had to expect this (Score:5, Interesting)
He had to know this would cost him his job.
He could not have expected anything else.
Points to consider (Score:5, Insightful)
There are at least two important points we can take away from this:
1. The republican party lies about having free market ideals.
2. The current IP regime is NOT an example of free market economics, even though it is widely touted as so.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
1. The republican party lies about having free market ideals.
You just realized that politicians lie?
Re: (Score:3)
Its a shame that you don't seem to understand that.
Re: (Score:3)
They are pro-business, not necessrily pro-market. Subsidies, tax loopholes, monopolies, cartels and all kinds of other corporate welfare are just fine and dandy when its their own that have their snouts in the trough..
Re: (Score:3)
Do you oppose Corporate welfare in general, or just (R) supported corporate welfare? How do you feel about bailouts and loan giveaways to failing businesses (Solyndra) (true government welfare) that is all the rage among (D) people?
Re: (Score:3)
The Bush administration delayed the Solyndra approval because the beancounters had serious doubts about the company. The application was on the path to dying.
But then Solyndra's rich backer, who was also a major Obama supporter and bundler, along with the execs, lobbied the Obama administration to approve it. Other companies were told no lobbying allowed, you get approved on the merit of the application.
So, to appease his backers and to meet a deadline for a big presentation on green initiatives, the Obama
Re:Points to consider (Score:5, Insightful)
Republicans are in favor of big business running your life. Democrats are in favor of big government running your life.
Neither major party is in favor of you running your life.
Re:Points to consider (Score:5, Insightful)
This is actually quite...funny, because it's got truth in it.
But the real beef is the axing of a grunt soldier because he has voiced an opinion not necessarily accepted in the mainstream party line. And that is what is sad, and this is happening everywhere, but it does not get in to headlines that often. Staffers are shown the door all the time if they happen to write proposals that are not on the accepted agenda. Career in politics as a non-elected staffer is very windy one, even more than elected ones (at least they have their seat until the next election). Seen that, not been there but followed closely. It is quite sad really, because only the very strong ones can voice fresh, conflicting views, and to get to that position (as a non-elected official) usually requires years of ass-kissing and selling yourself out before you have strong enough position to speak freely.
Re: (Score:2)
Are their lips moving? Then they're lying.
Another Young Idealist Casualty (Score:5, Insightful)
He had to know this would cost him his job.
He could not have expected anything else.
He's 24 and probably still believes that United States politics offer an open and free forum where you can put forth ideas no matter what side you're on and the change that follows can be a good thing if the logic behind it is sound. Surely the worst that could happen is that your party would have to explain again logically why your brief was incorrect and unsound?
Boy it sure was hard typing that with a straight face.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Another Young Idealist Casualty (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Idealists are those who are willing to sacrifice themselves for an idea. This would be perfectly fine if they weren't so often willing to take those around them with them for the ride. I'm in no way saying I disagree with the guy or what he said, but in completely contradicting what he knew to be the viewpoint of his employer publicly he used his position to try and spread his own ideal at the expense of those he worked for. He caused embarrassment and possibly even damage to his employer because he thou
Re:Another Young Idealist Casualty (Score:4, Interesting)
Except you missed something important. His memo wasn't released on his own initiative on his personal blog. It was approved by the committee that had him write it in the first place. He's being hung out to dry because he's low man on the totem pole, not because he went rogue. Far from being a loose cannon, he followed orders. And look what it got him. Not only is he being fired, but just because he's being fired, you instantly assumed he did something wrong.
Re:Another Young Idealist Casualty (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't believe anyone goes into politics with that attitude. I think people get into politics because they want to make a real positive change.
But once they get into office, they discover that the only way they can get anything at all is to strike a deal with an existing Devil, which earns them their junior grade horns. From there, it's not far down the slope to the pit of lying to anyone for a few reelection dollars - and there's no climbing out of that pit. So they grab a pitchfork and become a fully licensed devil, striking "deals" with the next crop of new guys.
highest bidder! (Score:2)
Highest bidder wins all! The US political system in a nutshell...
Principled conservatism (Score:5, Insightful)
You younger Slashdotters may not believe this, but at one time we had conservatives (and Republicans) with principles.
(Not that the Democrats are all that great.)
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:5, Interesting)
You younger Slashdotters may not believe this, but at one time we had conservatives (and Republicans) with principles.
There are still; we're just not Republicans (or, more accurately, Republicans are no longer conservative).
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:4, Funny)
Then John Wilkes Booth killed him and it's been downhill ever since.
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh...Teddy Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower were both after Lincoln and both principled conservatives.
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:5, Informative)
Teddy Roosevelt was a conservative? You're joking, right? Did you hear that from Rush Limbaugh or Fox News? You do know that the Bull Moose Party that he founded was a progressive party, right? Teddy Roosevelt is well known as being a leader in the progressive movement of the early 20th century. To call him a conservative is an absolute joke.
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:5, Interesting)
Not that great? Ont the subject of being bought by Hollywood, The Dems are demonstrably worse. Hollywood, & all the IAAs give much more to the Dems & you'll never see a similar paper from an equivalent Dem study committee as they clearly know who their owners are.
Re: (Score:3)
and Limbaugh, shirley?
And St. Reagan (pbuh) for bringing in the religious loons.
Re:Principled conservatism (Score:5, Informative)
You might want to wipe the foam from your mouth and actually read about the history of civil rights and see who's consistently been on the side of those who want to work hard and be a member of society
Yup - they were usually called "liberals" and "progressives", same as they are today. It just so happens that Republicans were a liberal/progressive party since pretty much forever (already during the Civil War), until they were turned around at the end of the Civil Rights era.
Have They Addressed and Refuted It? (Score:5, Interesting)
If my employer came to me and said, "Pack it up, you don't have a job tomorrow." I'd be very interested in knowing why and being completely fine with my termination if they were just batshit insane in their reasoning. I'm sure I'm not the only one that suspects this came as an order from an industry lobbyist or at least in the form of "This is very interesting work by Khanna. On an unrelated note *cough* *cough* you might be hard pressed for campaign donations next election cycle."
Oh, and I am absolutely relishing the goodwill and lip service paid to the Republicans in the initial Slashdot comments [slashdot.org].
Re: (Score:2)
Fear Will Keep Them in Line! (Score:2)
If one of my workers told the whole country why he thought I was stupid, I'd fire him too, regardless the merit
HA! "Fear will keep them in line"? Well, I'm sure the rest of the country has great faith in you if your response to a challenge of your position is to just get rid of the guy. Oh my god that's funny! Did you know that in my software development team, we challenge each other all the time and, no, we don't have our coworkers offed if we are wrong. Is Derek Khanna on his way to the gulags? Perhaps a Republican Rehabilitation camp in Fairbanks, AK?
Re:Fear Will Keep Them in Line! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
If one of my workers told the whole country why he thought I was stupid
If you're so touchy that someone writing an article that doesn't exactly line up with your beliefs 100% makes you feel stupid, then I'd be glad to be told so, so that we can all avoid working with you.
Incidentally, this is why the Republicans can currently only get 30% of the country to identify themselves as Republican, they "purified" out everyone else who was only mostly conservative.
Re: (Score:2)
Or maybe the bigger reason is that they know the only people who will care that matter are the IP holders who are lining the
It's because Republicans love 'free market' (Score:3)
except when they don't!
Re: (Score:2)
'free market' as in for sale to the highest bidder. Makes it really nice for the pockets of those who make the rules.
Re: (Score:2)
Surprised? (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is why the Republicans lost the election (Score:5, Insightful)
Your on the right track, the Tea Party led a purge of the moderates from the party a couple years back. The result was that the shifted even further to the right and lost a bunch of moderates in the middle of the political spectrum. The result was to also chase away a lot of the moderates / independent voters as well.
Since there are more independents in the US than there are Democrats or Republicans this is what cost them the election. Independents /always/ decide the winner of the presidential election.
They need to have a hard look at their internal hard line on political issues. Even Reagan would fail to meet most of the current Republican agenda and would be cast out (as would a number of other historically significant Republicans). The net effect is to ostracize younger voters and the result is costing them future voters. It's not that moderates were voting for Obama and the Democrats nearly as much as they were voting against Romney and the Republicans.
The Republicans need to go back to giving the general population something to believe in. Study Reagan and you will see that he did that so well the term "Reagan Democrats" was coined to describe the effect. People can't believe in tax cuts for corporates and the rich, it's too abstract for their day to day life. Unless they regain the moderates and start giving people something to believe they will continue to lose more and more voters.
Re:This is why the Republicans lost the election (Score:4, Interesting)
We have Rove and others absolutely convinced they were going to win the election, because they refused to read the polls.
Exactly this. I read the polls in Summer 2011, saw that only one candidate in the Republican field could beat Obama in any polling match up, so I worked for that candidate (as a County Chair, even though I'm a registered Democrat) and we did OK (he got 2nd place in my State, in both parties' primaries).
But he did not fit the mold of what the Party Bosses were looking for, so their media lapdogs did as they were instructed, and pretty soon it was clear that Romney was the anointed candidate (by March at the latest). Not once since then did I not say that Obama was guaranteed re-election.
And it turns out in retrospect that all the quality polls were :dead on:. The Republicans could have had the Whitehouse if the fake "Republican values" really represented the ideas of the party (vs. being Corporatist puppets in reality).
Funny thing is, my candidate would agree with this report almost in its entirety. If there's a silver lining it's that Khanna's generation will be in charge in 30 years.
Re: (Score:3)
Oh, who was that? The only sane Republican who ran in this election was Huntsman.
Re:This is why the Republicans lost the election (Score:4)
This firing suggests they have no intention whatsoever to "get it" ...
FTFY. When the quest for campaign financing outweighs their obligation to the electorate, this is what you get.
Re:This is why the Republicans lost the election (Score:4, Insightful)
But they didn't lose, they were just given 4 more years of control of one house of congress, a mandate by the people to prove how bad obama is for america!
Except more people voted for Democrat representatives than for Republicans. The Republicans only won more seats due to Gerrymandering [wikipedia.org]. That is hardly a mandate.
Gerrymandering is easier for Republicans because Democrats tend to be concentrated in urban areas. It is easy to set up reasonable congressional districts that are 80-90% Democrats, leaving Republicans to sweep the rest. But even when the Democrats control the redistricting process, it is hard to find anyplace that is more than about 60-70% Republican.
But there isn't much of mandate for the Dems either. Polls showed that more voters agreed with Republican views of smaller government, but were turned off by their social policies. Single young women voted for Obama by two to one over Romney, not because of economic policy, but because they don't accept that rapists have a God-given right to father children.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
In today's episode (Score:4, Funny)
Continuing trend... (Score:5, Insightful)
From the article:
Many things the Republican Party is doing are surprising moves, for a party that is looking for ways to attract...well, anyone. It almost seems like the party forgot that the point of democracy is to represent your own people, not try to tell them that you know better than they do what would be good for them.
Fundamentalist Christian paternalism (Score:3, Insightful)
From the article:
Many things the Republican Party is doing are surprising moves, for a party that is looking for ways to attract...well, anyone. It almost seems like the party forgot that the point of democracy is to represent your own people, not try to tell them that you know better than they do what would be good for them.
Actually, that attitude is very much in line with what large chunks of the hard-right fundamentalist Christian faction believe. They want someone with greater authority to tell them what to believe, what to do and think.
Dan Aris
republicans love corporate entitlements (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
They really seems to be hellbent on political suicide at this point.
A party that benefits the top, say, quintile, and also favors opportunity rewards for work, has historically done well in America. We all like to think we'll be in that top portin one day.
However, when it gets too narrow, you can't make it work in a democracy. I think there's a real argument to be made for "if taxes are just too high on the wage bracket most small busines owners are in, that really hurts jobs". But the current GOP is not
Memo taken down. But there's a backup copy. (Score:5, Informative)
Backup copy. [keionline.org] (And because the document was created by a Congressional employee, it's not copyrightable. So there.)
Here's the proposal:
This is a good proposal. Start circulating it around. For only a very small number of copyrighted items is there revenue beyond 12 years, and that's covered.
Re:Memo taken down. But there's a backup copy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe, maybe not. The last 10 years if I read that right would cost 10% of the total revenues thus far for the protected intellectual property. That's revenues, not profits. So it would be paying 10% of what that IP brought in over the course of the previous 36 years for another ten years. How many commercially owned properties are earning a 10% profit margin even at release?
Re: (Score:3)
That's kind of the point. Unless you think you will make enough money in the next 10 years to justify paying 10% of everything you've made, you aren't going to renew.
Alternatively, creators that think they will be selling forever can just roll the cost in ahead of time, which will allow other creators(e.g. DJs, fan-works) that don't care about the long term can discount their works and sell more on the short term.
also he speaks arabic (Score:2)
The real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Politicians are not just corrupt, politicians have been raised, grown up, got their experience in a system where the truth is told, more or less. In the real world, we know evil exist but politicians are shielded from the real world pretty early on. They are in a rare world where meetings and negotiation "work". As you learn the world of politics in high school and university were your adversary are at worst teachers or fellow students and then ONLY those students who are interested in politics. They are surrounded and protected by people who share the same world view, not just left or right wing but the idea and knowledge that money is never an issue, you can always find another job, multiple at the same time, hard work is having a long meeting and there is always a deal to be made with the other side and the other side is never ever really just out to screw you over.
In Holland, when the rail system was privatized, a contract was drawn up that allowed the rail company to do its own customer survey reports and ignore user reviews that scored to low. Choose its own lines to ignore for judging its punctuality, not have to count canceled trains as delayed and a lot more stuff that any sane person would NEVER have allowed in a performance contract. So... were the people who signed it bought off? To stupid to be allowed to live?
Yes... and not exactly. The parties responsible BELIEVE in privatization, all their models, all their advisers say it must work and surely business wouldn't lie to them because they don't lie, they just present facts that exist in their mind and not in the real world. Their was a parliamentary investigation on whether privatization in the last two decades had a positive effect and the answer was NO and the two parties (CDA VVD) STILL said what was needed was MORE privatization.
They can't do anything else because it has become their identity, it is what they are, their faith, their gospel. And any evidence to the contrary isn't going to shake a faith they grew up on. The left isn't much better, the multi cultural society is falling apart and the best the left can manage is "we shouldn't want that"... Groen Links (Green Left) was decimated in Holland when it became clear the party had lost all touch with reality in supporting several right wing measures, forgettin they were supposed to be a LEFT wing party. CDA has been recudeced to a fraction of itself and still doesn't know why. SP scored big in the polls but lost it all during the actual election and still is wondering what happened.
The arstechnica article expresses suprise at this move because it thought the republican party was trying to appeal young voters. WRONG. Oh it wants to attract more voters but it is NOT going to change itself, it can't. It is what it is. To change itself, it would first have to admit it was wrong, ALL if it, ALL of them, ALL they ever believed to be true. WRONG. People don't do that. Especially people who live in an ivory towers removed from all reality. Romney wasn't a particular evil guy, he just really believed his fantasy land, the made up world of Fox News.
And people living in made up worlds are easily manipulated by people good at telling stories. The Lobbyist know how to bend the world of make believe to reflect their wishes. The ordinary voter doesn't. Not only is the average voter barely coherent but everyone one of them has an endless amount of conflicting wishes so any politician who tries to actually listen will quickly realise that if you can't please them all, why bother. In the mean time, the lobbyist gives a clear simple and therefor sensible and achievable story.
Basically, we are screwed. We need more REAL people in politics but the only way to get anywhere in politics is to grow up in it and become part of the system. Any real person will either quit in disgust, be torn apart by the pack for daring to rock the boat (any outcast public figure like Assange) or become part of the system.
You could try an experiment if you got the time. Write down your
It's the perfect time for them to do this (Score:3)
It will be completely forgotten by the next election.
Good Editing, Timothy (Score:3)
Posted by timothy on Thursday December 06, @02:15PM
What got posted is an edited version of my submission, and the editing is a distinct improvement. Thanks, Timothy!
"Pro-business" = Pro-Already-Rich-People (Score:5, Insightful)
I think most of us realized long ago that when politicians claim to be "pro-business" they are referring not to some abstract ideal of free markets, but rather to being in favor of the incumbent players getting richer and more powerful. But just in case anyone on Slashdot hadn't figured this out yet, hopefully after this event they will have.
Derek Khanna for congress (Score:5, Interesting)
I think he should stand by his memo and run for office.
Republican vs. Conservative (Score:4, Insightful)
Copyright reform should be the conservative position since our current state of copyright is so far out of line with the original constitutional text and intent. Conservatives rightly complain when we use foreign law to influence interpretation of the Constitution, yet our copyright has been warped to follow the copyright schemes of most foreign countries, not ours, and that's somehow considered constitutional.
Abandoning their principles, the basic reason the Republicans lost, and will keep losing. All the Democrats have to do is not screw up too badly.
Re: (Score:3)
All the Democrats have to do is not screw up too badly.
In other words, both parties are royally screwed.
What if this happened in the Democratic party (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't mean this to stick up for the Republican party at all but does anybody really believe that the Democratic party would welcome this report any more than the Republicans? Would a Democrat who wrote this report still have a job afterwards? I doubt it. Both sides are in bed with corporations and especially the media ones.
Re: (Score:3)
They won't. The Dems lean Hollywood, both by voting district and campaign funding. The hope would be that the GOP could serve as a useful opposition party on this issue. Apparently not.
Re: (Score:3)
But now they are both the same. Again.
The Most Probable Reason (Score:5, Insightful)
While I hate to see them distance themselves from a sane and rational argument for copyright reform, I can't help but think that any other organization would do the same thing when one of their employees decides to go all "cowboy" and fire off memos and reports without organizational consent.
Dear Congressman (Score:5, Interesting)
Dear Mr Kline,
I'm deeply disappointed in my GOP caucus at the dismissal of Derek Khanna for his writing of a paper discussing copyright reform.
(ref http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/12/staffer-axed-by-republican-group-over-retracted-copyright-reform-memo/ [arstechnica.com])
I sincerely hope you weren't "one of the congressmen" Rep Scalise was approached by to remove Mr Khanna.
Copyright reform is a desperately-needed, serious issue. "Shooting the messenger" signals that the GOP is NOT the party interested in fixing the situation. To less charitable eyes, it might even seem that these Representatives are just doing the bidding of their lobbyists from the MPAA and RIAA donors. The *only* silver lining here is that the Democrats are even MORE obviously in the pocket of media producers.
I invite you and your peers to review the Copyright Clause of the US Constitution: (art I, sec 8, clause 8) "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
Note, copyright is to PROMOTE THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE - not to promote the ongoing rent-seeking by the umpteenth-descendant of an artist. Further, the clause specifically says "LIMITED TIMES" - constantly revising copyrights out to longer and longer durations is complying with neither the letter nor the intent of the US Constitution.
So, I ask MY PARTY representatives in Congress - what's your point here?
I would love to get a serious, considered response to this email, or would cheerfully like a chance to talk to you on the subject.
Re: (Score:3)
The thing is, this could actually have been a good wedge issue for the Republicans if they had run with it instead of backing off. It tends to be younger people who care the most about copyright reform, and the young are a strong Democratic voting bloc. Advocacy of copyright reform on the Republican side could have forced the Democratic Party to risk either alienating its younger supporters or losing the support of the big-money boys in Hollywood. But apparently the Republicans aren't willing to piss in the
Re: (Score:3)
Let me explain something to you. People vote Republican because they are hoping that their taxes won't be raised as much as if they vote Democrat. It is absolutely that simple. I have met people who actually want their taxes to go up, but such people are always Democrats. Republicans are motivated by their wallets.
I'll get modded into oblivion (will I make -3?) for saying this on Democrat dominated slashdot but what seems to motivate Democrats is anger and jealousy. They want to make anyone who makes more m