I would like to thank Professor Lessig for inviting me to begin a dialogue with you.
Wherever I travel throughout America, including here, the issue of corporate media and media accountability arises in every question and answer session. The American people are deeply concerned about the erosion of democracy, notably the impairment of free speech which has occurred through the increased concentration of market power in corporations which own newspapers, radio and television stations.
I’ve spent a great deal of time studying this issue. I hold bachelor’s and master’s degrees in speech and communication from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. During my academic career, I studied the Failing Newspaper Act, which provided for joint operating agreements (JOA), which presaged the death of afternoon newspapers in America. In my own lifespan, I’ve seen the city of Cleveland go from 3 daily newspapers, the Cleveland News, the Cleveland Press, and the Plain Dealer, to just one. I’ve studied the Federal Communications Act of 1934, which set specific responsibilities for broadcast license holders to serve “in the public interest, convenience, and necessity.” H.L. Mencken, the famous critic, once wrote “freedom of the press is limited to those who own one.” Indeed, the Constitution is liberally interpreted when it comes to the government having any role in directing what goes into print. And that is as it should be (that is not to abandon questions of horizontal and vertical market concentration). However, holders of broadcast licenses have specific responsibilities to the public. It is the public which owns the airwaves. The public provides a license in exchange for service. At the same time the definition of media has expanded to include interactive services, the requirements of service have been largely abandoned as media monopolies have grown more powerful. Community groups struggle for recognition, social and economic causes which run counter to vested interests are marginalized, and our politics are corrupted by having to raise huge amounts of money from one set of corporate interest to buy airtime from another set of corporate interests.
As the next President of the United States, I intend to address this issue directly. First, the Justice Department will engage in an ongoing dialogue with major media over how the public interests can be better served. Second, I will sign an executive order which will require all broadcast licensees to provide free time for all federal candidates. Third, additional funds will be appropriated for the support of public television and public radio. Fourth, community cable systems will receive guidance as to how they may more effectively enlist community participation in the airing of broadcast media programs. Fifth, a White House conference on the protection of the First Amendment and its relationship to media concentration will be formed to enlist the participation of academics, activists, and the industry, in order to facilitate a broader and more effective understanding of the central role which media plays in the life of our nation.
Your comments and suggestions are appreciated. It is through such dialogues on democracy that we can fulfill our responsibility to form a more perfect union.
Dennis J. Kucinich
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
This entry and my personal blog are licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Dennis, regardless of whether you are chosen as the nominee, will you agitate to ensure that third parties such as the Green Party and the Libertarian Party and the SP-USA are allowed to participate in the same presidential debates as Democrats and Republicans? Do you agree that it was a travesty of justice that Ralph Nader was excluded from the presidential debates in 2000, even though repeated polling suggested that an overwhelming majority of Americans favored his inclusion?
_ Jeremy Good, Greens 4 Kucinich
Thank you, Congressman, for addressing the media issue. Many of us are well aware that the public interests are not being served by major media sources. I truly love your proposal to provide free airtime to federal candidates. That is something that I’ve always considered vital to a truly democratic process. There is something frightening, not to mention offensive, in the realization that the public only hears from the candidates with the wealthiest coffers.
My sole question on the policies you’ve set forth is whether involving the Justice Department will bring about more of the same undo influence by the occupying administration some of us are seeing today? Obviously not under the Kucinich administration, but I suspect that would be a concern for your successors.
It is the public which owns the airwaves.
This is a detour, but can you think of any reason why the basic principles applied to Treaty interpretation [1] that lead to Maori Spectrum should not be applied to Treaty interpretation by the US Federal Courts? How do you suppose the transfer of spectrum would change the economies of states with large reservations?
[1] Treaty of Waitangi
Greetings, Dennis, and welcome to Philadelphia. It’s good to have you in town.
I’ve been interested in your campaign for a long time now and look forward to actively campaigning once I return to school in St. Louis next week.
I deeply admire an issue you touch upon here — free time allocation for federal candidates — as microcosmic of your entire philosophy of opening up politics to everyone, not just those with money. Your congruent approach to advocating for free airways, refusing to take corporate contributions, and advancing campaign finance reform is compelling and will resonate clearly.
This is an area where you can truly differentiate yourself proudly. There is no issue that arouses as much suspicion and feeling of negativity among people of all ideological backgrounds than the distrust of corporate influence. By firmly setting yourself apart as one who refuses to be influenced in this way, you will appeal to a wide audience — and call on other candidates to re-evaluate or reconcile their corporate-filled coffers to the general public.
Keep up the good work. You’re bound to shine tonight.
Mia Eisner-Grynberg
However, holders of broadcast licenses have specific responsibilities to the public. It is the public which owns the airwaves. The public provides a license in exchange for service.
It would be a good idea to try and get up-to-speed on technology. Over 85% of Americans now get their TV programs from cable or DBS, so the issue of public ownership of airwaves and government control of content is irrelevant to all but Marxists.
One suggestion for your campaign: don’t emulate Howard (the weasel) Dean by using Spam to raise money for your campaign. It pisses people off.
Of course most of those cable and DBS channels are owned by the same media multinational corporations, so the fact that 85% of Americans choose to sip from the cable spigot instead of the free network spigot of the same corporate entity is not really relevant. When a handful of companies own or control almost all of the hundreds of different spigots, it really doesn’t matter if you choose spigot A or spigot B — you’re getting the same perspective from the same source.
This is the fact that the right wing never brought up as it argued that media ownership rules were out of date. ‘Look at all those new cable channels,’ they cried. All owned by the same 4 or 5 companies, I replied.
Yes, Nick the fact that the owners of the media control the spin, not reporting facts, makes me a little more than upset. I’ve finally come to ignoring what is broadcast. This seems my best option. I’ve come to rely on the underground word, internet, and well researched books, or word on the street. The Nation, Greg Palast, Jim Hightower…etc. these are the only journalistic spigots worth drinking from, as is Dennis the only human (I don’t even consider him a real politician- he’s far above that label) worth voting for.
We need to work towards protecting any take-overs on the internet…I feel this coming in the future.
Thanks everyone for participating in democracy, enlightening people with truth and information.
And thanks Dennis for the breath of fresh air. We’re working diligently for you in Maryland.
To Richard,
Re: the non-importance of the public airwarves to “all but Marxists”:
Who do you think owns the rights to those programs you’re talking about? Who owns the rights to the cable channels? How closely are they tied to the cable providers? To satellite providers? How closely are they tied to the movie industry? The DVD industry? The music industry?
And then, when you finish answering all those questions, you’ll understand why corporate control of the airwaves is an issue that resonates with a whole lot more people than the “Marxists” to which you referred earlier.
If you want to ask Congressman Kucinich the nature of the ‘public ownership’ he envisions, that’s certainly valid (and relevant). But there’s no need to smear him for no good reason by comparing a thoughtful, well articulated post demonstrating real vision to the posts of other candidates.
Yes, Shawn, capitalist corporations own TV and radio networks, newspapers, cable systems, and DBS networks, and people like you and I own the corporations. We expect these corporations to return a profit on our investment, and that goal generally precludes policies on their part that unfairly limit free expression of ideas. It (the profit motive) also precludes their sitting idly by as music is stolen, and this has become very upsetting to a number of people who feel that their monthly broadband bill is a license to enjoy all the music they want at no additional charge.
I propose a public education campaign – at taxpayer expense – to get the message out that it’s wrong to steal music, and that when you steal music you’re taking food out of the mouths of musicians’ many children, modeled after the anti-smoking ads.
Congressman Kucinich, will you support this campaign? The misuse of the Internet for illegal purposes threatens all of our freedoms, after all.
Richard,
Rather than simply asserting that KaZaa and other programs are illegal without making that point, perhaps you should back up and start right there.
And, when you finish doing that, perhaps you can then tell me how making a copy of a cd using a cd-burner isn’t being prosecuted by the RIAA, too? I’ve ‘stolen’ far more music — thousands of times more, actually — by copying tapes and CDs than I do over the ‘net. What’s the difference?
Some federal judges have had a hard time answering that question of late. Perhaps you should think about it for a while. You can read about that in today’s Wall St. Journal, come to think of it.
“I will sign an executive order which will require all broadcast licensees to provide free time for all federal candidates.”
I’m not sure having the President sign a piece of paper requiring private companies to give politicians free stuff is that great a thing.
RIchard,
In our discussion on the daftness of “broadband and/or wireless” as an answer to the access question, given by the previous candidate, if memory serves, you didn’t make the market penetration claim for that set of ip/(xdsl+cdn) that you now make for video/(cdn+dbs). If the prior candidate’s “broadband and/or wireless is the answer” (I’m paraphrasing) is implicitly benefiting primarily the $50-and-up/month suburban demographic, not the $10-to-$20/month dialup demographic, is your “85% are CDN|DBS” statement (at a similar or greater monthly price differentia) an overstatement?
I operate a dialup isp, so this subject isn’t hypothetical. You and I differ about the polarity of gravity, but that’s just politics. The economics of access at the edge is where I thought we were on the same page.
“to get the message out that it�s wrong to steal music”
Richard….isn’t this already being done, by the RIAA and various (almost all) of the music labels ? and with what taxpayer money are you suggesting ? do you mean the tax money that was just cut by Bush, or the tax money that is paying US soldiers ?
Congressman Kucinich, welcome to Richard Bennett. He is a regular here, and is known someone who from time to time brings up good topics, but yet manages to squash any good conversation about them due to a lack of listening and a knack for being insulting and unproductive.
Not that I doubt your ability to withstand unfounded criticism, mind you. Just wanted to warn you that Bennett is a well-known curmudgeon in these parts.
Good luck with the blogging here!
Richard, I have to wonder if you work for the RIAA. I would say that downloading music hurts the musicians less than the RIAA/ Recording Industry does. What you don’t seem to see is that the internet gives musicians a new distribution channel if they choose to use it. It would allow them to get out from the under the cartel of companies that put a strangle hold on the radio, tv, etc…. It would actually allow for more creativity. The idea of intellectual property is insane. If you would like to take that idea to the extreme why wouldnt the public schools need more tax money to pay for all the IP they teach your children every day? Those are idea’s none the less are they not? Ideas are not property in the sense of a loaf of bread. By passing on an idea you do not gain or lose anything physical. I take personal grief in the fact that you can no patent business processes, which to me makes no sense. How can the process of doing business be patented? Makes me want to go back to the days of barter and trade.
“[C]apitalist corporations own TV and radio networks, newspapers, cable systems, and DBS networks, and people like you and I own the corporations.”
No, Richard, “people like you and I [sic]” don’t “own the corporations.” People like Rupert Murdoch own the corporations. Yes, many people like you and me own a few shares of stock (mostly indirectly, through mutual funds and the like) in those corporations. But those minuscule share-holdings hardly translate into “ownership” in any but the most narrow legal sense. The practical influence of most shareholders, as such, on corporate practices and policy — in the media and elsewhere — is nil. That is why we need to engage through the democratic political process to ensure that media conglomerates and other corporations serve the public interest, and not just the narrow profit interests of the few who hold meaningful ownership interests. And no, Richard, despite the pipe dreams of certain economists, the two interests do not necessarily coincide.
I’m glad to hear your stance on the concentration of U.S. media ownership. Unfortunately, the horse left the barn awhile ago. You remember the days when the Cleveland Plain Dealer competed with the now-defunct Cleveland Press. With only a small handful of exceptions, newspaper competition was long ago wiped out in almost all the major markets.
Clear Channel Communication has been allowed to destroy the radio industry, now owning what? 60-65% of the audience, I believe.
Then there’s this story about how a handful of powerful contributors to the Bush campaign are about to push through a merger that will make by far the strongest Hispanic voice on the airwaves one that is exceedingly friendly to the right wing of the Republican Party.
So the question is, with media diversity having seriously eroded over the past 20 years, how do you propose to restore it?
To “Ugh”- what free “stuff” are you talking about? Maybe I’m just strange but it seems to me for people to be informed about their choices in the voting booth they need to hear ALL the candidates without the bias of who has the money to pay for it.
Moreover, who do you suppose has more experience budgeting and prioritizing spending? The guy who has money to burn or the one who has relatively modest funds? I’d sure as heck like to see what the man of modest means has to say about federal spending and revenues, since he knows what it means so spend his money carefully. Unfortunately with Murdoch and crew running things, we get to hear from the wealthiest candidates while the less wealthy, yet equally(more?) important candidates, are swept to the side. Not exactly democracy in action.
The “free stuff” you’re talking about isn’t for the politician, it’s for the people. Does the phrase “informed choice” mean anything to you when it comes to voting?
The economics of access at the edge is where I thought we were on the same page.
I don’t think we have an issue regarding Internet access; I raised the issue of cable and DBS in connection to claims on public ownership of broadcast airwaves, and the candidate’s claim that the public trust mandates certain behavior from TV broadcasters. I’m pointing out that his thesis is outdated. I don’t see the nexus with dial-up ISPs, actually, so perhaps you’ll clarify.
No, Richard, �people like you and I [sic]� don�t �own the corporations.�
Half of all Americans own stock, Eric, and our interest in the stock that we own is the same as Rupert Murdoch’s or Warren Buffet’s: when I own stock [note grammar: not “me own stock”], I want its value to increase. So if I own stock in Verizon, I want the company to invest in fiber optics to every home in their business territory only if the company can make money from the investment. If the company makes money from pumping out Phil Donahue’s socialist pap, more power to them; if they make money from pumping out Bill O’Reilly’s fascist pap, it’s all the same to me, all about profit. If you want to do social work, go work for the government or a non-profit. If you want to take part in the liberal economy, buy stock.
What you don�t seem to see is that the internet gives musicians a new distribution channel if they choose to use it.
By all means, but they can only use it effectively if the people honor their copyrights and actually pay them for their music. That’s what’s so odd about music theft advocates: by denying artists copyright protections, you’re making them slaves to the record companies, and that’s just plain wrong.
Rather than simply asserting that KaZaa and other programs are illegal
I made no such assertion. I simply assert that it’s wrong to steal, and the government should educate the young people on this point, because recent surveys indicate that the young people believe that theft of music is somehow legal.
Richard,
You propose that we teach our childred that it’s wrong to rip, mix, and burn… Good idea in theory. Do you have kids? I do…
Aidan was two or three months old when he began to smile at Maria and I. If you have children, you know the joy when you look at this fragile new innocent being and see the twinkle in their eyes and see the first smile begin to emerge. The innocence at that age is electric. Love permiated the room when he copied our smiles and actions.
When he was 6 months, I remember placing his fingers in my mouth so that he could feel my tounge move when I pronounced. I remember playing bethoven and mozart, hoping that an early exposure to complex musical patterns would open new doors for him later. We all spent time singing happy birthday songs, and the ABCs. He must have learned to sing his ABC’s by the time he was two. He would stare at my mouth when I spoke…just searching for the way it moved to create these sounds himself. I’m sure that he felt my pride in his actions. Almost four now, he’s quite a linguist, and he has received nothing but accolades by ripping, mixing and burning everything he hears. People love him for this…
Experiencing the world through his eyes, and now his younger brother Olivers’ eyes, has brought clarity to my own adult behavior. I get flashes from things that my mother and father said when I was young… My parents were always overjoyed when I memorized and repeated things that I read. They were even happier when I mixed things up and used my mind to assemble new arrangements.
At some point, I don’t remember when, someone told me that copying was bad. It must have been a shock…and I’m not sure that I really believed them at first. Now, I know that it is often illegal, but I still don’t think that it’s wrong… I have a copying machine, a fax machine, and a computer and I constantly copy things and share them with my friends. In fact, I don’t know anyone who doesn’t.
Thanks to the innocence of Aidan and Oliver, I’m beginning to see why almost everyone I know uses a copying machine and fax to rip and burn protected works, and why millions of kids trade music without feeling guilty. Funny thing is, almost all of them feel a need to support the creators…
The question to you Richard, at what age should we start teaching our children that it’s wrong to rip, mix, and burn? How about when they first start to smile;)
Richard,
Instead of condensing each rebuttal into a quippy, out-of-context quote before responding, why don’t you engage the arguments made against you? It’s not cordial to dismiss 3 separate arguments against your litany of assertions with a sanctimonious response like this one.
I specifically asked you how you reconcile the illegality of file sharing with that of copying cd-rs, and you completely ignored the question.
Since everyone who has ever used KaZaa to download music belongs in jail, as the RIAA (and you) seems to say, shouldn’t all citizens of America who burn CD-Rs subject to the same punishment?
How many people should we fine or imprison from ‘stealing’ what the record industry never owned in the first place?
10 million?
20 million?
How many people should we stick in jail, Richard? Or should we just fine them and give the money to AOL Time Warner, Clear Channel and Viacom?
Is that really what you’re suggesting should happen?
Richard,
your statement “Half of all Americans own stock” is very misleading
The fact is as follows
Household distribution of common stocks in 1998 (i.e. who “owns” the corporations and gets profits). Note that in 1998, only 48.2% of Americans owned any stock at all (either directly or though mutual funds, 401k-type defined-contribution plans) and only 36% of Americans owned stocks worth more that $5000.
The top 1/2% own 37% of the stocks
the top 10% own 86.2%
the top 20% own 96%
Wealth is even worse
Average household wealth by wealth class
Top 1% $10,203,700
Next 4% $1,441,200
Next 5% $623,500
Next 10% $344,900
Next 20% $161,300
Next 20% $61,000
Next 20% $11,000
Last 20% -$8,900
Source: http://tiger.berkeley.edu/sohrab/politics/wealthdist.html
MerryChristmas in August
Rajiv
“because recent surveys indicate that the young people believe that theft of music is somehow legal.”
I think that the RIAA is going to continue doing more of that anyway, and that tax dollars are better spent educating kids about other, more important things.
I hope you are not including Lessig in the group of people you call “music theft advocates”, or even mistaking him for someone who thinks we should deny copyright protection.
By the way, Richard….whether or not artists have copyright protections, most (99%) of major label artists out there will be (and are) slaves to the labels anyway. To say any different would be to admit you don’t know what you’re talking about.
Richard,
You’ve put forward a figure for market penetration for video/(cdn+dbs) at 85%. I know you put it there to support a conclusion. I’m conclusion-indifferent. I’m asking about the market penetration claim. Before you made the claim, it had never occured to me that “classical broadcast” and dialup demographic might be strongly correlated — if it is, I’m changing my ad buys! If your claim for video/(cdn+dbs) is correct, then the ip/(cdn+xdsl) access (or priviledged access) demographic — the “Dean voters” — is a lot bigger than just suburbia. That’s why I think your claim may be an overstatement. I think your claim is significantly high, and as I mentioned, this is indifferent of the conclusion you are offering that data in support of.
Hey, a dangling participle! Well, gota feed the menagerie.
My figure, which I pulled out of the air, is a little high, Eric: the actual number is around 76%, not 85%. See this report.
Can you buy TV ads for “through the air only” consumption?
Rajiv, thank you but I was already aware that income is not distributed equally in capitalist economies. As neither IQ nor education nor drive nor ambition nor hard work is distributed equally, this doesn’t concern me. In Cuba, a Marxist government has ensured that income is more equally distributed among non-party officials. As a result, everyone is poor, even more than they are in West Bengal and Kerala under periods of Marxist rule.
It’s a hard world out there.
Shawn, what does your license say?
Dennis, I am very supportive of your candidacy for President. It is good to have someone with a heart, someone that realizes and appreciates the personal and devastating effect many of the policies and activities of the Bush administration on many Americans and other global citizens. I wanted to ask you if you have had an opportunity to visit the web site http://www.truthisbetter.org regarding electronic voting. This is an excellent site and each premise is backed up by additional information. What do you intend to do about the problems of electronic voting prior to the 2004 election?
Dee –
The “free stuff” I’m talking about is the air time that candidates or corporations would otherwise pay millions of dollars for. That a presidential candidate is advocating transferring such a valuable thing to himself and other politicians through the fiat of an executive order strikes me as an extraordinary position, and I thought I’d comment about it.
As for the “free stuff” being for the people and not the politicians, then why isn’t he (or you, though maybe you are/will) saying he’ll sign an executive order requiring all media outlets to give free air time to federal candidates? And why limit it to federal candidates, isn’t “informed choice” just as important on the state and local level as it is at the federal level? Do you/he think that Prof. Lessig should be required to allow any “federal candidate” a guest blogging stint? What does it take to be a “federal candidate”? Do you have to be on the ballot? Does CBS/ABC/NBC/FOX have to give the same amount of time to, say, David Duke as they do to a sitting President?
These are some of the issues that people tend to gloss over when they want “informed choice” or “free time for all federal candidates.”
As far as your comment on wealthy/less wealthy candidates, I don’t recall a bunch of middle class/poor people winning the Presidency (or even senate seats) before the recent hysterics over “mediacon.”
That last one was mine.
anon: whether or not artists have copyright protections, most (99%) of major label artists out there will be (and are) slaves to the labels anyway
Granted, artists are exploited by record companies. Given that, how can you believe it’s good to further exploit them by stealing music?
Oops, a bunch of others crept in – the last anon was mine.
Richard,
My comment on that is that most of the top 10% wealth is inherited, and not acheived by IQ or education or drive or ambition or hard work (of course luck and chance play a role — for every Bill Gates, there are a hundred software companies that went bankrupt)
Rajiv
Sorry, Rajiv, but that’s not the case. Thanks for playing, though.
I have one short question, requiring a less than short answer:
Mr. Kucinich, what would you do to ensure that the internet remains an end-to-end network?
Quoting Mitch Kapor, via The Future of Ideas, “Architecture is politics”
Richard,
Thanks for the correction (down 9%) and the provenance of the data. I’m still iffy about the corrected data, since for stuff like this census data, or data published in Campaigns and Elections, or data published by the networks, cable, and satellite operators for ad pricing (so they can be sued for fraud) is, IMO, “better data”. In two hours I haven’t found out.
Can you buy TV ads for �through the air only� consumption?
Don’t know. Radio and print works for me and doesn’t put my money in TimeWarner’s pockets.
That is your opinion Richard. I have data to back up my statements. Do you have data to make that blanket statement — “That is not the case”
Rajiv
what would you do to ensure that the internet remains an end-to-end network?
Outlaw NATs???
Please use some marker to denote “end-to-end” as having the private non-sensical pseudo-meaning invented by Mitch Kapor, and not being the “end-to-end” defined in J[erome] H. Saltzer, D[avid]. P. Reed, and D[avid]. D. Clark. End-to-end arguments in system design. ACM Transactions on Computer Systems 2, 4 (November 1984) pages 277-288. An earlier version appeared in the Second International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (April, 1981) pages 509-512.
Every computer scientist on earth will thank you. I know I will.
Richard,
Granted, artists are exploited by record companies. Given that, how can you believe it�s good to further exploit them by stealing music?
I understand your point that musicians should be compensated, but let us not forget that the RIAA is suing for incredibly large sums of money. How much of that money is any artist going to receive? Why should anyone pay an exorbitant fine to line the pockets of the executives of record labels who claim to be protecting the interests of musicians? I’d rather send my $15 to the artist directly than support the middle man.
Richard Bennett of course is the name of a New York laywer who went to work at Vivendi as self-proclaimed Copyright Czar. You are hogging bandwidth, sir, with your multiple replies. Here is the fellow who called Howard Dean “deanie baby.”
The topic of information policy, open protocols, and a guarantee of end-to-end freedom are all objectives of the group who have petioned WIPO for a hearing. The $200 million that Bush has raised will be earmarked for misleading TV advertising and will cause his downfall. Especially compared to the lies and dissemblings which all of America watches “the telvised holocaust” as Iraq crumbles into horror and misery. There will be no answer for this disaster.
The candidate who pays attention to the technology constituency and gets the message out to millions of newly qualified voters will rule the day. The dinosaur Big media blackout will no longer work.
And yes, all the music kiddies will flock to MoveOn and Rockthevote.
A lot of technical issues require attention. You’ve some to the right place, Dennis, the economists, academics, musicians and constitutional lawyers are here. I hope that a Policy Group is convened in the next administration.
The RIAA has become the most hated entity since the IRS. The neccessity eternal protecting corporate copyrights will have to give way. Science itself is in danger of being strangled by the pipes of TimeWarner/AOL and Comcast/ATT. Music cannot be the “canary in the coalmine” as Albhy Galuten claims, if it means privatizing scientific journals, fencing off databases, and blocking the peer review of stem cell research and global warming.
Getting a bit hot in here?
TOM
Dear Mr. Kucinich
Are you in favor of a government created internet infrastructure in which high-speed internet access is provided to all residents similar to our highway and freeway system (possible once wireless technologies are able to span greater amounts of area)? The bill being fronted by local, state, or national (or some combination) authorities. Funds for such a network can be raised by placing an uniform tax on access similar to tolls. While advancement in technology is certainly necessary for this to become a reality, the rate at which this technology is developing is extraordinary.
Best regards,
Pravin
OK, Rajiv, you have problems with the caste system, which is understandable in the Indian context. In America, this isn’t something that people lose sleep over. Some wealth, like some IQ, is inherited. But the history is that dumb people who inherit money soon lose it, so it’s no big deal.
Eric, I’ve been working on an essay on the end-to-end mistake, and the best statement of the principle I’ve found in the RFC literature is this from RFC 1122, section 1.1.2, Architectural Assumptions:
(b) Gateways don�t keep connection state information.
To improve robustness of the communication system, gateways are designed to be stateless, forwarding each IP datagram independently of other datagrams. As a result, redundant paths can be exploited to provide robust service in spite of failures of intervening gateways and networks.
All state information required for end-to-end flow control and reliability is implemented in the hosts, in the transport layer or in application programs. All connection control information is thus co-located with the end points of the communication, so it will be lost only if an end point fails.
This isn’t really a political statement, is it?
Richard Bennett of course is the name of a New York laywer who went to work at Vivendi as self-proclaimed Copyright Czar.
That’s not me, dude – I’m the guy who invented WiFi and UTP Ethernet.
Thanks for playing.
Speaking of Congressman Kucinich, I’d like for him to speak out on his opposition to the liberation of Iraq. There was a time when those of the left were in favor of liberating oppressed people from tyrannical dictators. A few went wrong on Stalin, but most came back to the right side (except for those in ANSWER from the Workers World Party.)
How can we take anyone seriously as a champion of the oppressed who’s willing to allow mass rape, torture, and genocide to take place for years right under our noses and not take any sort of effective action against it?
It seems like criminal negligence to me.
Tom Barger –
While the issues surrounding the discussion on this blog are important, comparing the RIAA to the IRS in terms of the level of hate shows the “my issues are most important” bias of this (and many other) blog/chat rooms/web sites. If I had to put my money down, my guess is that 90% of the public (or more) couldn’t tell you what the RIAA is, what it does, or that it has any connection to the music industry. OTOH, the vast majority of americans know about (and hate) the IRS because they are required to (or at least required to know, if not hate).
Dennis, when looking at these issues, the mootness of it all makes me wonder if it isn’t all just another academic exercise at our expense.
Until corporations have their non-existent ‘personhood’ removed (if Thom Hartmann is to be believed), what can possibly occur to truly ‘fix’ our democracy? Corporations have all the privileges, yet none of the liability of persons, including death.
Could you please address how you would work to remove this cancer from our country?
Richard,
I always appreciate it when someone cites either 1122 or 1123, those were the first two RFC’s I contributed to during their drafting. If you’ll take a look at rfc2804 (wiretap), and at the raven list archive, you’ll see the issue of state in routers was considered, and ultimately rejected, nominally because replication of flows (the tap) and all of the attendant session state management would make routers more complex to implement, and more difficult to debug in operational environments. We didn’t conclude that wiretaps were “wrong”, just that they are likely to be a new source of bugs, hence contrary to best practices and sanity. Similar to the state-problem in RSVP flows.
YMMV, but having participated in the drafting of 1122/1123, while at SRI and working for ARPA/DARPA/SPAWAR/… I think there is a lot of economics and politics in 1122. After all, routers twinkle, by design, in a universe where node-failure and alternate path creation are … ahem … highly dynamic.
So, 1122 is not, repeat not, a document lacking non-technical context, and people like you and I should use S/R/C in their original.
The most telling part of SRC’s “End-to-end arguments…” is the bit about the IMP with the bad memory board, IMHO. They found a need to force programmers to enforce checksums in the host, and all it cost was removing all serialization, re-transmit, and flow control from the IMPs. My what a price we paid for that.
You can’t really do multicast or any kind of real-time with an end-to-end philosophy on flow control and reliability, so we keep talking about taking state out of routers and then having to put it back in to make the new stuff work. The IPv6 Stream looks awfully stateful to me, for example.
Richard,
While I tend to agree that we don’t have a “right” to take music that musicians don’t want us to take, any musician who has sense will encourage the free distribution and trading of their songs.
Record sales aren’t what make a musician (in the current system at least) money. Touring and merchandise and other “extras” are what make money.
Encouraging the distribution of your music increases potential listeners, fans, concert goers, t-shirt buyers, future release buyers, backcatalog buyers by literally hundreds of thousands of people. Most of whom would never have heard your songs or even known who you are.
Personally, I believe that any direct negative impact on the artist from file sharing is far outweighed by the indirect benefits and goodwill created.
The only people who stand to lose are record companies, who couldn’t care less about music and only see a commodity (as evidenced by the rot they pump out). Record companies have gone from facilitators to dictators and that is WRONG.
Musicisnas don’t need record companies they need distribution.
… any musician who has sense will encourage the free distribution and trading of their songs.
I don’t know enough about the music business to comment on that – it could be that the model that works for Herbert von Karajan and the Vienna Symphony orchestra doesn’t work for Snoop Dogg or Dr. Frank. But I think the choice should be theirs, and the “let’s lynch-mob the RIAA” mentality takes that choice away from them.
The technology-plus-copyright issue that concerns me most right now is touch screen voting. Without a well-maintained paper trail, touch screen voting is open to all kinds of mischief, from hacking to outright election-rigging. Touch screen systems could make the Florida 2000 vote and count look fair, honest, and open.
Dennis, please comment on this. I want very much to vote for you, but after I do, I want my vote to be counted, accurately. I realize it is time to apply advances in technology to voting and vote counting. However, I am deeply concerned about the method chosen to “improve” the voting system.
Anyone besides me worried about this?
“Third, additional funds will be appropriated for the support of public television and public radio.”
I agree on all points from this entry except the quote above. I value public television and radio too much to have it tied closely to government. I’m sure that under a Kucinich administration they would feel no pressure, but future administrations (and Congresses) could use funding as a weapon to keep certain viewpoints off the air. I would, however, like for the Federal government to raise awareness of the public nature of public broadcasting; many conservative pundits are all too willing to let their viewers believe that public broadcasting is fully funded by tax money.
� any musician who has sense will encourage the free distribution and trading of their songs.
Nope. Bennett and I agree about the polarity of gravity on this one. Indians call the trafficing done by non-Indians “cultural expropriation”. It isn’t smiled on. We work WIPO, we work the UNHCR, we work the BioDiv Directorate, we work … Indigenous IPR venues to defend our cultures from expropriators.
For those that keep long-term ICANN/WIPO score, this is where the IIPC parted company amicably with Brett Fawcett’s group. Naturally, the Metallic group (MPA et al) didn’t want Indians to have institutional status in their IPC.
“How can we take anyone seriously as a champion of the oppressed who�s willing to allow mass rape, torture, and genocide to take place for years right under our noses and not take any sort of effective action against it?
It seems like criminal negligence to me.”
I dunno, why not ask Bush why he isn’t going into country after country where this kind of atrocity is going on this very day. Oh, he only does it when the country has strategic interest to the U.S. and all the other rape, torture, and genocide victims just have to suffer?
While the issues surrounding the discussion on this blog are important, comparing the RIAA to the IRS in terms of the level of hate shows the �my issues are most important� bias of this (and many other) blog/chat rooms/web sites. If I had to put my money down, my guess is that 90% of the public (or more) couldn�t tell you what the RIAA is, what it does, or that it has any connection to the music industry. OTOH, the vast majority of americans know about (and hate) the IRS because they are required to (or at least required to know, if not hate).
weeeeellll…. i’ve never seen the IRS pursue high profile lawsuits against minors. i’ve never seen the IRS pursue and win lawsuits for losses of earnings which they cannot even prove actually happened – nobody can yet prove beyond reasonable doubt that file sharing has caused the mainstream music industry any losses whatsoever – in fact Tempo’s studies show that in many cases file sharing leads to an increase in CD sales.
i’d say 90% of young people know exactly who the RIAA are, because they are being persecuted unjustly by them. i’d say the same group probably have little or no idea who the IRS are, beyond the fact that they might have to pay some taxes once they finish their studies.
-iriXx
“how can you believe it�s good to further exploit them by stealing music?”
Richard — I never said that it was. Feel free to reveal your idiocy by yourself, but do NOT put words in my mouth. What I did say was that spending tax dollars on educating kids on something that will be apparent soon enough is a complete waste, considering the more important things that need those dollars.
“�let�s lynch-mob the RIAA� mentality takes that choice away from them.”
Pointing out how terribly thought-out your comments are is tiring. It is not the RIAA that is the problem here, and most people here (including Prof Lessig) realize that. The problem is with copyright: its definitions, its limits, and its perception among the public and record companies. To restrict the issue to be only about the RIAA would be immature and short-sighted. You are similarly short-sighted if that’s where you think the core issue is.
Sorry to burst your bubble Iain,
Perhaps you could check out the following opinion:
http://www.morphizm.com/recommends/interviews/palast_money.html
“In Britain, I can turn on BBC and get programming that doesn’t always embarrass me. But there’s no place to turn in America. They give you these pseudo-liberal oases like Charlie Rose or something, but that’s just more of the officialdom talking at you. I think the worst thing that ever happened to America was the public broadcast system. PBS is more dangerous than Fox, because it is the lie that you’re getting some type of alternative, that you’re getting a fuller picture, when in fact you’re just getting more syllables to tell you what Mobil Oil wants you to hear. In fact, NPR pulled me off the air the other day. They were going to run a show about the “Screwing of Cynthia McKinney,” until someone realized that I said that NPR had fabricated her words as much as everyone else. Actually, it’s the NPR report on McKinney that was the worst; they took two separate parts of a radio interview, linked them together and completely misstated her words. So, at the last minute, they pulled me off the air just before I was supposed to go on.
ST: Yeah, I was listening to NPR the other day and they had some guy from the Heritage Foundation on there. If I want to hear what the Heritage Foundation thinks, I can go to Fox.
GP: Exactly. Obviously, some assistant producer at NPR thought it would be good to have me on there to talk about the media, but only to have some general blather and definitely not to talk about NPR, of course. Basically, it tends to be more liberal — what I like to call social liberal — but there’s no challenge to the basic economic program of the New World Order. Every one of their writers is pro-globalization. Do you realize that one of the most left-wing writers in America with any stature is Thomas Friedman, who once wrote that all of our economic problems were solved by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan? That’s our most liberal columnist.”
Come on Iain, turn off your tv!!
Peggy,
I have the same concerns and am becoming active locally. Here is what I found Dennis has written on the topic:
http://www.denniskucinich.us/index.php?topic=blog
“Americans have become very sensitized to manipulation of the vote since the debacles in the 2000 presidential elections. All over america, people are expressing to me their concerns about honest elections, about election technologies, about the ownership of voting machine suppliers, about the potential for fraud…all of which can undermine our democracy. We need solutions. Here’s what we can do: we can organize in every community across this country into citizen groups of individuals with technical expertise in computer programming, systems design, and working knowledge of elections. These precinct activists can begin immediately to create a template for securing the 2004 vote. The elements of such a program might include: taking action to gain access to inspect the technology, to learn what safeguards have been put in place to make sure that no coflicts of interests are involved, and to make sure there are no problems with the chain of custody. What I’m advocating is monitoring the vote. Maybe we should call it MTV2004…Monitor the vote 2004. Perhaps we could begin to post our ideas to the wiki http://www.civicactions.org. We will need to organize state by state or county by county. If anyone has any ideas, please go to the wiki and let’s act collectively to ensure a fair election in 2004. “
And if you want to really know how it happened go here:
http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=217&row=1
Truth,
Julie
I dunno, why not ask Bush why he isn�t going into country after country where this kind of atrocity is going on this very day.
You think, after the profoundly negative reactions from the liberal media (both here and in the UK) and objectively pro-fascist pacifists to the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq, Bush should be willing to take that kind of abuse to liberate Myanmar, Zimbabwe, or North Korea?
Interesting perspective you have, dude. Now tell me which countries you’ve felt were in need of liberating so strongly you demonstrated in favor of US intervention; I’m guessing it’s a short list.
Meanwhile, somewhere distant from the rattle of gunfire … in the secluded privacy of some oasis …
I mentioned that the mailing technique used currently by the Kucinich Campaign volunteers in Maine employs tracking gifs. (Coments to Lessig’s heads-up of yesterday). I’ve noticed that Lessig’s own blog interposes a tracking data acquisition site (extreme-dm.com), so here’s that bit of cruft:
Ahh… That is a 1×1 there, in the uncommented-out bit at the bottom of that little fragment, isn’t it? The rest of the javascript isn’t worth de-tagging to include, but anyone who views your index source (index template in MT-speak) can see it.
I suggest that you (Lessig) use webalizer on your local logfile, rather than shipping your reader’s data — unique endpoint identifier as well as temporal references — the who/when/what — to a third party, who’s privacy policy is not disclosed on your site.
Wow! They are in the EU, in NL in fact. And they claim they don’t track email addresses, but when you look at their webalizer-lookalike example, it is chock-a-block with unique endpoint identifiers. The absence of any revenue hook (ads) suggests you’re paying via ibill.com for the (occult) service.
I didn’t expect this. I am surprised. I didn’t “opt-in” to 3rd-party data collection. Did anyone?
Dennis, I too am concerned the erosion of democracy, and freedom of speech.
My concerns lie with the ease that electronic voting machines can fraudulently manipulate elections with Help America Vote Act of 2002 funding.
Representative Rush Holt’s proposed amendment HR2239 will not stop electronic voting machine fraud.
The minimum requirements for ensuring Fair Electronic Voting Programs are: 1. Open source or public programming instructions. 2. A backup paper ballot in case of electronic failure, and 3. A pre-election certification and post-election verification of the programming instructions.
The third condition is necessary because no court order can make the machine language programs humanly readable after an election. The verification test must be set up prior to the election.
There are also ways to make electronic voting machines tamper proof. Please contact me, [email protected], for a more detailed explanation. I have been working with the professor who runs the Center for Scientific Computing at the U of Utah and other technicians on this issue since May.
Here is a web site page with information that I believe is urgent for Congress to understand:
http://www.truthisbetter.org/database/ObjSubPg.php?article_id=38&info_category=SOLUTION
or go directly to http://USTogether.org then “Solutions” then “How to Make Electronic Voting Programs Fair” then “Read More”
Ugh!-“The �free stuff� I�m talking about is the air time that candidates or corporations would otherwise pay millions of dollars for. That a presidential candidate is advocating transferring such a valuable thing to himself and other politicians through the fiat of an executive order strikes me as an extraordinary position, and I thought I�d comment about it.”
It absolutely is an extraordinary position, from an extraordinary candidate. And I’d expect you to comment on a blog like this one. I responded because you seemed to have a problem with the proposal and I’m trying to find out why.
“As for the �free stuff� being for the people and not the politicians, then why isn�t he (or you, though maybe you are/will) saying he�ll sign an executive order requiring all media outlets to give free air time to federal candidates?”
I believe Congressman Kucinich addressed that he would not attempt to have similar coverage in print media-” Indeed, the Constitution is liberally interpreted when it comes to the government having any role in directing what goes into print. And that is as it should be (that is not to abandon questions of horizontal and vertical market concentration). “
As to limiting it to Federal Candidates, the reasoning is pretty simple logic really. On a state level television and radio coverage is not critical to being known to all potential voters. Newspapers and local television already cover State/county level candidates pretty well as far as I can see (though some do choose to go the grassroots route). I’ve yet to see an election on the local level when I didn’t know all the candidates and their issues, I HAVE seen that happen in Federal elections. In point of fact I see it happening now.
Furthermore, local elections do not determine the course of the entire country for the next four-eight years, nor does a lack of airtime mean the constitutional right of the people to select their Government is impeded. Local television doesn’t marginalize candidates based on finances because voters would rise up in outrage, or at least those of us who care enough to pay attention would.
The purpose of limiting it to airtime is just as the Congressman explained- the airwaves belong to the people, the Government is supposed to be selected by the vote of the people, National media has a duty to the people to provide access to ALL candidates in a Federal election. Print/electronic media is not the same. And let’s be honest, electronic media has been the main source of information for at least one current Federal candidate in this race.
I don’t want mass media limiting my access to the Candidates for President and I’m rather upset to be watching it happen to greater and greater degrees. For that reason the Congressman’s proposal seems like an excellent solution, to me. Also, it might be worth mentioning the proposal didn’t suggest unlimited airtime, just that it be free of charge.
Another way the media robs us of our democracy: polls.
By taking and publishing polls, people strategize and compromize. Every cycle of “If the election were held today, who would you vote for?” drives people toward the duopoly created by our single-vote system. As a not-quite-front-runner-(yet) candidate, Rep. Kucinich should be very concerned about this issue.
Solutions:
In appreciation of the communication opportunities that the internet provides through formats such as the blog, I would like to introduce a new topic.
Dennis, what do you see your role will be as Commander in Chief? What is your national security vision? What role will the World Space Preservation Treaty and Act, and the Department of Peace play in your national security policy, in a transition program for the Pentagon and the aerospace industry, and in the future of global security?
Thank you for considering these questions in a time when terrorism and arguments in favor of a strong national military defense are repeatedly emphasized by the Administration of George W. Bush and the media.
Richard, you da man. Don’t ever change.
ROFL. What’s a “objectively pro-fascist pacifist?” It sounds like an oxymoron. Anyway, I take your point. Ultimately, I agree with the theory that the current Bush administration viewed Iraq as unfinished business. They are also the last gasp (I hope) of the old Cold Warriors, who will only apply military force when our direct strategic interest is involved (remember Bush campaigned against our involvement in the Balkans) but are all too happy to use it unilaterally once they determine that our strategic interest is threatened. As has been endlessly quoted, they did Afghanistan because of Al-Qaeda (and messed it up), and did Iraq because it was “doable” (and looks like they’re messing it up as well). In both cases they had global support, either from sympathy for 9/11 or from UN resolutions (however shakily applied). There are no resolutions that I am aware of calling for Myanmar, Zimbabwe, or North Korea to change their behavior, and they have not attacked the U.S. (though North Korea may be or may soon be capable). So you can’t put them on the same level as Iraq and Afghanistan.
There’s your answer, Nick; go read up on “realpolitik.”
There was obviously much conversation over reform of voting systems and the Electoral College in the aftermath of the last Presidential election, and predictably little follow-through on such talk. (Granted, the nation was a bit distracted by planes crashing into buildings.) I am curious to hear your comments on the plausibility of three specific election reforms and how emerging technology plays a role:
1) Returning the Electoral College to its original design by awarding votes based on Congressional districts, eschewing the current practice of winner-takes-all, to encourage third party participation in federal races.
2) Prioritized balloting, which could permit a voter to rank candidates rather than committing to just one, with the winner decided through automatic run-offs. Again, the beneficiary will be political diversity by encouraging votes for candidates rather than broad centrist strategies.
3) Technology upgrades to standardize and speed up the tabulation process. What do you see as the timetable for significant adoption of reliable electronic voting?
Thanks for this campaign. I was a bit stunned when I saw that 2% share of the CNN poll yesterday, but I take solace knowing you don’t give up easily.
My apologies for the consecutive posts.
Something just gives me the willies when I hear about this proposed “Department of Peace.” Maybe it’s the “Ministry of Peace” from Babylon 5 (the TV show), which was more concerned with keeping the peace domestically than overseas and employed tactics straight out of the Ernst Roehm SA playbook. It’s bad enough that our Department of War got renamed the more saccharine “Department of Defense;” apparently that wasn’t good enough to protect us, as we now need a “Department of Homeland Security” on top of it. Now we’re going to go for the hat trick, and wage peace on ourselves and the rest of the world.
From the Kucinich web page on the proposed Department of Peace:
Truly a frightening document, even to a professed liberal like myself. The League of Nations was established after the First World War to provide a place for nation-states to resolve disputes peacefully. It collapsed when it turned out that some nations would not play by the rules. The Kellogg-Briand Pact outlawed war as an instrument of national policy, but only until it became inconvenient. Neville Chamberlain bargained with Hitler and thought he had secured “peace in our time.” History records his folly in the blood of millions. Now, Mr. Kucinich proposes to bargain with human nature itself. How can you teach peace in a world where people will gladly kill each other over invisible lines on a map or ethnic affiliations or differing religious beliefs? And we’re not even going to worry about other cultures who might be inimical to ours; we are going to start with our culture, and use it as an example to the world. At least until a decidedly non-peaceful country decides to take us over.
Let’s not have a Department of Peace. Please. We’re not ready.
Interesting comments on the potential misuse of the “Department of Peace” title as an alternative to the “Defense Department” as an alternative to the old “War Department.” The semantic creep in society over the last several decades has indeed allowed us to cover more than a few dirty truths with clean white lies. I don’t think Kucinich has that in mind when he suggests Department of Peace” as a title — rather, it seems like it’s a way to set the mission of the department as one of bringing peace instead of violence.
But… wouldn’t it be interesting to rename the Defence Department something truly blood curtling to make us think twice about using such a branch of the government to accomplish a “Reasonable” goal? I mean — if it were titled the “American Invasions and Strategic Killing Department” it would certainly make it hard to argue that we bring peace with B-2 bombers!
Then again, I’ve been accused of surrealism more than once 😉
ROTFL- Thanks, David, that was beautifully done!
To Rob- It seems to me either you don’t understand the point of the Dept. of Peace or you have no faith at all in humanity. If it’s the former, I suggest watching Hear It From the Heartland, Harkin’s event with Congressman Kucinich. If it’s the latter, I can’t say I blame you.
Whichever one it is, spend some time listening to Congressman Kucinich on the subject and on his own view of humanity. Then again, maybe for some of us it’s just a good feeling to find that at least one influential person sees a better future for humanity, and that it’s the same one we’ve all wished a catalyst for. Maybe, just maybe, Congressman Kucinich IS that catalyst. That’s where I’m placing my bet.
And with that I think I’ll go to bed without even waiting for you to hand me my tin-foil beanie. (laughing)
Lynch mob the RIAA, yes I think we should personally. I have been voting with my hard earned money over the last 3 years, all be it the economy is driving me to try and save more of that money every day. I go without a cell phone, unless work says I need to have one. Where I am moving too I wouldnt even have a land line phone, since I can get high speed internet and not from a telco or cable company, but again life says I need one. I would much rather support an artist via merchandise/shows than buy a cd. A friend of mine is a big phish fan. He signed up to be a member and can download all the phish stuff he wants for the sign up price (I think it was $10). There is an example of a band that is doing their own thing. I would want to wager though the RIAA is trying to still go after people who have phish stuff eventhough it may be legit. As for the RIAA, some of the stuff I have read and understand is that they are trying to go so far as to say that I can’t convert a CD Audio track to an MP3 or Ogg file. Now where do my fair use rights come in from owning a cd?
Richard Bennett wrote: ” [note grammar: not �me own stock�]”
Duh. But also not “people like I own stock.” Your understanding of grammar is as tenuous as your understanding of political economy.
Typical Leftist control freak nonsense. Can you imagine the shit that would hit the fan if John Ashcroft came out and said,
“First, the Justice Department will engage in an ongoing dialogue with major media over how the public interests can be better served.”
Will there be anything left to the First Amendment by the time you get around to holding a meeting to protect it?
“Will there be anything left to the First Amendment by the time you get around to holding a meeting to protect it?”
Well gee, how much is left of it now? Considering the “Patriot Acts” both I and II, the revelation that someone in the know thinks nothing of revealing covert operatives by name to the press as revenge for freely speaking, one man arrested for waving the US flag at the sitting President, and several people investigated for what they read, I’d say we’re not very free to speak our minds today.
What’s comical is that Congressman Kucinich is the ONLY candidate I have ever run across who has never spoken an outright lie that I’ve been able to find. I think we’re entitled to truth from our leaders, and after this administration’s record of lies, half-truths and cover-ups, I’m ready to trust the one guy who doesn’t hedge his bets or hide from unpleasant facts.
“What�s comical is that Congressman Kucinich is the ONLY candidate I have ever run across who has never spoken an outright lie that I�ve been able to find.”
ROTFLMAO.
“[A] government can do any thing on pretense of acting for the public good. . . . It will gradually concentrate to itself all the reserved rights of the people; it will become the great arbiter of individual prosperity; and thus before we know it, we shall become the victims of a a new species of despotism, that of a system of laws made by ourselves. It will then remain to be seen whether our chains will be the lighter
from having been forged by our own hands.”
–William Leggett, Evening Post, 1834
I am delighted that a presidential candidate is a vegan and is bringing this word and its meaning into the common awareness – about what it is to be a vegan and what it means, as far as health to animals, including humans, and the ecology of the planet and our environment..
I am equally delighted that the idea of a new cabinet department – for peace – is an awakening idea for our country. These issues and others give me a reason to be interested in this candidate. Otherwise, it is way too much of the same old story – I would not feel represented pretty much about anything.
So, how can a candidate with such vitrues actually remain true to his values once in office? It seems that the pressures are so great and the powers so large once in office, that compromises end up being the only way to get anything accomplished.
what are your ideas about this?
thanks, Hyla Bolsta
My previous statement-�What�s comical is that Congressman Kucinich is the ONLY candidate I have ever run across who has never spoken an outright lie that I�ve been able to find.�
Brian’s oh so constructive response-ROTFLMAO.
The implication being that you have knowledge of the Congressman having outright lied. Care to share it?
What a coincidence. As I was reading an article in yesterday’s New York Times concerning spam, Lawrence Lessig himself was mentioned. Here’s the excerpt concerning Mr. Lessig:
The Bandwagon to Fight Spam Hits a Bump
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/11/technology/11SPAM.html?th=&pagewanted=all&position= />
Second, I will sign an executive order which will require all broadcast licensees to provide free time for all federal candidates.
This is about the best we can hope for. The argument, (and somebody walked all around it, but didn’t state it plainly) is that much of the corruption in our government comes from high cost of elections. In order to get donations, favors are done. The idea is that by removing one of the highest costs of campaigning, and shifting that cost on to the people who lease the spectrum, works on the problem from two angles.
One, it means that one could run a successful campaign without having to spend vast amounts of money on advertising, and thus avoid having to bend over backwards and make promises for funding.
Two, it shows the people who are leasing the airwaves who really owns them. And frankly, they should thank us for providing such lucrative licences in the first place. The idea of removing such a large, revenue stream from an exploitive industry is merely icing on the cake.
So the power shifts away from those who can make $500,000 donations and lease vast portions of our media spectrum and back to those that own it. By the people, of the people, for the people. And holy crappin’ Jesus, that’s not Marxist propaganda, it’s the American Way of Life. Now IF I had said the Government should revoke all licenses and reserve the public airwaves for ‘only’ public good, then you red-scarer(s) might have something akin to an argument (and get a thought exercise on why communism failed so miserably). As it stands now and if you read what is on the page, anyone who raises this spectre gets a personalized map to the closest windmill, where they can chase away commie ghosts to their heart’s content.
Also, the ‘ultimate solution’ is something along the lines of a nation-wide wifi network with a ‘hand off the pipe’ clause written in stone. Information carriers would be that and only that. The vertical integration in the media business is right at the boiling point, and I’m not sure it is one of those things that can fix itself very easily (or even be fixed easily). It’s tough to fix something that tells 100,000,000 people a night ‘I’m not broken’.
Our national highway system offered an unprecedented freedom of movement throughout the country and stands as a symbol for such freedom. A real ‘information superhighway’ could offer the same thing to this and future generations.
One that would let us shoot the finger at mass market crap that keeps the lowest common denominator listening, and go find the stuff that keeps the rest of our simple little lives enjoyable. Anywhere within our national borders.
Not to mention the TREMENDOUS personal productivity gains that such a system allows. 5 minutes here doing the bills. 10 minutes there ordering goods. 25 minutes over there as I find the story I want in second and don’t have to wait for the next commercial break. These minutes add up to days and weeks over the course of years. This technology is very cheap (and becoming more so by the day) but the benefits it can provide are enormous. Think ‘Fire’ and the ‘Caveman’.
There’s your grail (although as we get closer to it, it would vanish like the rainbow it is, and the quest would begin again).
Not sure how I like the Justice Dept. stuff. Ashcroft has so colored the group that their name only says ‘hypocrisy’ to me. Although, if you break with Bush tradition and publish the transcripts of the meetings, it’s much harder to form conspiracy theories. 🙂
Corporate Media and Media Accountability…..WHERE ARE THEY????WHY doesn’t the “silence of the media lambs” bother anyone????I’ve spoken to 10 people today who believe no one knows what is going on regarding the black out in the East….the same type of thing happened in Brazil…Rio Dark…
http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=257&row=0
Why is it that only he is reporting this????ANYONE ELSE HAVE ANY IDEAS? Has anyone seen any reports anywhere with a little bit of truth behind it?
The music industry (doesn’t that term gall anyone else?) typically makes between 88-92% of album revenue, leaving the remaining 8-12% for the artists. This is then split up. Only a smash success brings any real money to the artists.
The real money is in touring, which is precisely why Clear Channel and others have been buying up venues.
I say, set a percentage limit on the amount of the major venue market that any one entity can control (I would prefer 10-15%) to allow for fairer competition among the various venues.
And legalize file-sharing. At (typically) no cost to the business or the artist/s, it is possible to, on occasion, expand a group’s popularity, which increases their touring revenue.
If album sales truly drop, so be it. Let innovation be encouraged rather than stifled. I would rather see a large number of artists making an upper-middle class income from touring, artists who succeeded on their own merits, than see a small number of mega-rich who appeal to focus groups in studies put together by executives that hardly listen to music.
(Very sloppy post, I know.)
AUTOMATIC RUN OFFS & ONLY FIRST ROUND WINNERS GET TO RUN FOR RE-ELECTION THE FOLLOWING TERM
These two changes would be the best combination of two changes in our election system would be automatic run-offs AND any election not one on the first round of the run-off – that office holder can not run for that office the next term.
BENEFITs: this would provide features of term limits, encourage third parties, encourage participation even against stronge incombents. Also, will encourage candidates to attempt to respresent the broadest constituency possible. Would encourage broader news coverage of third party candidates — because it would make each election a potential point of significant change.
I agree that presidential electorial college needs to be on a congressional basis. This way a whole congressional districts choice would not be negated.
A blog is basically a journal that is available on the web. The activity of updating a blog is “blogging” and someone who keeps a blog is a “blogger.” Blogs are typically updated daily using software that allows people with little or no technical background to update and maintain the blog. Postings on a blog are almost always arranged in chronological order with the most recent additions featured most prominantly
Dennis, I shook your hand three times in Tucson, Arizona when you spoke there in 2004. You’re my hero!