Hollings vs. McCain on Broadband and Copyrights

tabdelgawad writes "The Washington Post has a mostly speculative article on the effects of John McCain (R-AR) replacing Ernest 'Fritz' Hollings (D-SC) as chairman of the powerful senate Commerce Committee. Topics in the article include the future of pending broadband and copyright legislation as well as the Senate's relationship with the FCC. Best quote from the article belongs to ITAA president Harris Miller: 'If Jack Valenti had been around at the time of Gutenberg he would have organized the monks to come and burn down the printing press' :-)."

Comments

Don't look for McCain to do good.

[the_Bionic_lemming]

Ever since he lost his presidential bid McCain's been the Democrats Democrat (yes, I know - He's a Republican in name only). His Stances and choices usually support what the Democrats want, and often exceeds their wildest dreams. Seeing as how the Entertainment industry is most entrenched in the DNC (Like Babs Streisand and others) look for McCain handing Everything the MPAA wants in a very short order.

This is a bad thing for opponents of the DMCA.

Re:Don't look for McCain to do good.

[MillionthMonkey]

Ever since he lost his presidential bid McCain's been the Democrats Democrat (yes, I know - He's a Republican in name only). His Stances and choices usually support what the Democrats want, and often exceeds their wildest dreams.

You know, I thought this petty viciousness against McCain had ended after he lost the primary in 2000. Can you offer any evidence to back up your assertions, or are you just parroting what someone told you on the radio?

I disagree with McCain on most issues. But McCain is an honorable man. He has certainly never stooped to dirty tricks like some other people I can think of.

"Shrewd Practioner of the Art of Compromise"

[ShatteredDream]

In English that means kiss half your rights goodbye on any IP issue. Note, just half. McCain is a media whore like most politicians that aspire to be anything at the national level and will not allow himself to be seen as partisan to either side. He'll try to make a sly push to appear to be the knight in shining armor that will protect both sides. But as we all know you can't protect one without harming the other.

The situation itself is IMO part of the problem with giving the public the right to choose their senators. It used to be that the states could keep their senators on a tight leash and guarantee the death of their political career if they acted so badly. Let's face it, the public doesn't have what it takes to reign in a politician this side of Hitler or Stalin.

One of the worst examples of compromise is Trent Lott. You all should have seen the joyous celebration at FreeRepublic when it was event hinted that he might resign. The man is not only a racist scumbag, but he compromised the values of every conservative and libertarian voter represented by the RP. I for one am glad as a (classical) Liberal to see him gone. The only thing that would make me happier is to see the 16th and 17th amendments repealed. The state legislatures need to be able to hold their senators' asses to the fire again to keep them from compromising on our rights.

There is one thing that I should mention on that note, one of the most overlooked problems with compromise on gun control is that it puts the public in a subordinate position, armamentwise, to the local police force. Look at Philadelphia, the land of brotherly love, where every black man is a suspect and much of the PD make the Gestapo look subtle. Pink Pistols' motto says it right when it comes to armed minorities, "An armed homosexual is not a bashed homosexual." Those "common sense compromises" only make such pigs more bold in their repression of minorities and dissenters. A cop with such an approach to executing the law of the land will think twice before trying to beat someone within an inch of their lives if they think the person is armed and knows how to use the gun. That is especially true for racial and ethnic minorities.

Sorry, half off topic, but worth noting.

He isn't?

[Bruce Perens]

I agree that the Nazi connection is going over the top. However, I disagree that Valenti respects your right to be an independent film-maker, or that RIAA respects the right of garage bands that are now finding it difficult to sell their own CDs. Independent musicians who dare to sell their music directly are inevitably suspected of bootlegging, due to RIAA and MPAA pressure. We've even having trouble selling Debian CD-Rs on eBay, because their copyright policy is "you must own the copyright to the material, or it must be in the public domain".

In the future, I suspect that MPAA and RIAA will try to make it impossible to distribute independently-created media without an expensive "anti-piracy" audit, just as license audits are used to shake down schools and businesses today.

Bruce

Actually he seems great as far as politicians go

[WebCowboy]

In the areas of policy of most concern to the Slashdot community (Telecoms, IP rights and so on), McCain is probably the best person the US has for the job. Based strictly on his voting record and the policies he defends, we often wouldn't see eye to eye, however philisophically he is very much in the same camp.

McCain tends to take positions based on a populist stance--certainly the best way to do it in a democracy. Less so than most other politicians he listens to ALL voters--not just Republicans, or corporations, or lobby groups.

That's probably why the Post article is all wishy-washy. Normally you can count on a Democrat to bend over and take it in the butt from Jack (Valenti, or most others in the entertainment industry cartels) and for a Republican to bend over and take it from Bill (Gates, or the BSA or others trying to lock people into their tech IP).

McCain is going to be hard to pin down by the pundits because he'll be influenced by everyone and anyone, and the press in north America is very poor at correctly gauging what populist sentiment is--it tries to steer public opinion rather than follow it.

All in all, it is a promising move to have committees steered by those like McCain. The press AND government these days really have a problem listening to what the public wants...

Will McCain support community radio, like before?

[shoji]

I am very interested to see how McCain's return to the chairmanship affects the movement for community radio and low power FM. McCain was the key ally in Congress that led to the passage of a low power FM bill (which allowed for some additional community radio, although it was gutted before final passage). Of course, McCain had recently been exposed as receiving money from the big broadcaster lobby -- so it remains to be seen how deep his commitment really stands.

Some relevent links:

• McCain's Low Power FM Bill Press Release
• Prometheus Radio Project, a key LPFM advocacy group

Re:Senator McCain

[Selanit]

I agree. Seanator McCain is very conservative. He is hawkish on the Iraq issue, and conservative on social issues such as abortion. And where these social issues intersect with tech issues, he will favor a conservative social stance. (Take, for example, his sponsorship of a resolution designating October "Children's Internet Safety Month", a term of dubious nature which could easily fit any one of a number of different positions.)

I myself am very liberal, and disagree with him on many such issues.

Nonetheless, John McCain is a man that I respect very much. I believe that, unlike come of his colleagues, he does his very best to serve the people. His long and vigorous struggle for campaign finance reform provides ample evidence, as do his efforts to curb wasteful spending, even in areas traditionally favored by conservatives, like Defense. He has also shown his willingness to work with Democrats on bipartisan issues. For these reasons, I respect him one hell of a lot more than Bush, or Cheney, or Hollings, all of whom spend more time serving their corporate cronies than their constituents. McCain and Senator Russ Feingold are, to my mind, the finest statesmen currently serving in Congress.

As I say, I disagree with Senator McCain on many subjects. Given his record, however, I think he is likely to handle this appointment in a way that the tech community will approve of. I suspect that he will put up a vigorous fight against the CBDTPA, on the grounds that it's a textbook case of special interests trying to buy legislation.

One thing I'm sure of: it's going to be an interesting ride!

Re:Nope, Jack Valentini...

[jc42]

Gutenberg invented the printing press at a time when books were worth their weight in gold (in europe, at least) ...

Well, maybe, but a funny anecdote from 220 years earlier: When Ghengis (not yet Khan) led the first Mongol exploratory expedition into the wild western lands, around 1220, one of the ways that the explorers supported themselves was by bringing along a troop of Korean printers. They made cheap printed editions of the Koran and Bible as they went, and sold them to the locals. This was, of course, one of the things that got them labelled as demons, since they were undercutting the monopoly that the local religious establishment had on these books.

But it had no effect in Western Europe, since the Mongol troop didn't get that far. And, of course, technology already in common use in Asia was not considered real by Europeans, even after demos.