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Howard Dean to Guest Blog for Lawrence Lessig

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the celebrity-guest-to-celebrity-host dept.

Ethanol writes "Starting Monday, Professor Lawrence Lessig (whom we all remember from Eldred v. Ashcroft) is going on vacation, and his weblog will be guest-hosted by Democratic presidential candidate Governor Howard Dean. Could this be a sign that a serious contender for President (tied for first for the nomination in the latest polls) has his head screwed on right about copyright law?"

12 of 1,246 comments (clear)

  1. Well he has my vote by javiercero · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I have seen a few of his appearances, and I must admit I am quite impressed with this guy. Then again maybe is that after 2.5 yrs of Mr. Bush my expectations for POTUS have been dramatically lowered.

    1. Re:Well he has my vote by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You've got to be kidding. Have you done some background work on Dean? I live in VT, and the guy is as slippery as an Arkansas governor. If you look at his history on the issues he supports he's actually proposed and pushed the EXACT OPPOSITE over the last five years. He is, in fact, a centrist dem and not a far left evangelist.

      I may not think Bush is the best option, but the better of two evils Dean is not. Basically Dean has repackaged himself to appeal to the far left which, because of the centrist nature of modern politics, has been disenfranchised by the dem party.

      You could say hes trying to pull a reverse bush; solidifying his base with the democratic hearland and then moving out to centrists on specific issues... he'll probably make the push sometime six months or so before the election.

      HOWEVER, there's a fundamental problem with that plan; the left isn't nearly as cohesive or well organized as the right, and he's depending on a skittish bunch.

      He'll lose, but he'll guarantee no other democrats win either.

      -rt

  2. Odd behaviour by aeinome · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Why would anyone let someone else keep their daily journal for them? And giving it away to a politician - that just begs for deep, dark secrets to be revealed.

    --
    When you don't have a leg to stand on, don't even get up.
  3. There's a thing by Apreche · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Check out http://www.selectsmart.com/president/

    it tells you which president to vote for based on your stance on the issues. I tested it out and it's very accurate. It gave me a reccomendation for green party 100% and Dean 96%. Since I really want Bush out and 3rd parties don't win, guess who I'm voting for? I'll probably read a few of his entries on Lessig's blog, and unless he's really unkosher this seals the deal.

    --
    The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
  4. Dean was governor of my state... by Zergwyn · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Overall, he didn't do that bad a job. In some ways Dean is actually an interesting mix of left and right. He is a former doctor, which partly explains a lot of his very strong positions with regards to health care. He certainly has come across as one of the strongest left standing democrats in many ads and articles, but he has an A grade from the NRA as he was not at all anti-gun ownership in Vermont. He is also reasonably fiscally conservative. Our state didn't go too overboard with spending, and we actually still have over 10 million dollars in our "rainy day fund," for what it's worth. My biggest quibble with his term was actually in regards to education, but a lot of that was the fault of the legislature and the courts (which ruled our old method was unconstitutional). Of the candidates, we could do a lot worse (come to think of it, we have been doing a lot worse) then Dean. Having met him, and lived with him as head of the state, I think he has some good ideas. I was actually kind of pro-war, but Bush has screwed us so badly on the domestic front in virtually every field, from economics to scientific research (VERY important to me) to basic civil rights, that I would vote for virtually anyone over him. I would recommend people look at his stands.

  5. /. slow to comment on Howard Dean's web success.. by cowmix · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Shame on /.

    Howard Dean has used the Internet, specifically blogs, better than any presidential candidate. Every day, you can read their official blog or countless other personal blogs that give up to the minute info on what doing on the campaign trail. I have never felt more involved, or informed in a presidential campaign until Dean's.

    All this use of blogs and such as created a tremendous amount grassroots support. Unlike other candidates that have raked in 1000s of dollars from big interests, Dean's campaign raised more than any other Democratic candidate last quarter mostly via the web with the average donation being $66 dollars..

    Anyway, I feel that no matter what Dean's positions are (btw.. I think they are great) /. should give a thumbs up to how he is doing biz..

  6. Re:Dean is a good choice by Elf-friend · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Okay, I know, don't feed the trolls, but it's too hard to resist:
    We need a strong president who will stand up to the nutcases and ban and confiscate all individually held guns and imprison those who don't turn them in
    Not to defend Dean (see my other post on the subject). But Dean has always been anti-gun control. Actually, Vermont has the most Libertarian gun laws in the country (according to the NRA). To wit, as a Vermonter, I have a legal right to carry a concealed weapon without a permit as long as I do so without intending to commit a crime (I think that's how the law puts it). We don't even have a law barring convicted felons from owning/possing firearms (they can't, though, because of the federal law).
  7. Re:Dean is a good choice by Funksaw · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To paraphrase Dean: "Talk about gun control in Vermont and you talk about taking people's hunting rifles away - talk about gun control in LA and you're talking about taking uzis out of the hands of gangbangers. Gun control needs to be decided at the local level."

  8. Re:Doesn't that suck? by dspeyer · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Voting reforms can help but they won't solve everything. Every voting system is abusable at a mathematical level. Take the following example:

    33% of voters prefer candidate A, tolerate candidate B and detest candadate C

    35% of voters prefer candidate B, tolerate candidate C and detest candadate A

    32% of voters prefer candidate C, tolerate candidate A and detest candadate B

    Common sense says B should win

    In our modern current system, B would win unless 3% worth of C voters decided that it was hopeless and they should vote A, in which case A would win

    Under instant runoff voting, C would be eliminated and A would win with 65%, unless 1.5% worth of B voted C so that A would be eliminated, in which case B would win with 66.5%. Now that's even more freaky.

    I think game theorists have actually proven that nothing works right regarding elections. Some improvements can be made (and I suspect IRV's flaws are less likely to become of practical importance than our current system's) but the real changes we need are an independant media and an informed public.

    --

    Sig:Why copyright isn't a fundamental human right

  9. The Dems don't want him or the green vote by gad_zuki! · · Score: 4, Interesting

    >. The Democrats are desperate for the voters that went Green last time, because they know they need them.

    The dems don't want him, they want their boy Gephart or *shudder* Lieberman. The DLC publically flogged Dean supporters by calling them "the activist elite" and tried to compare them to politcally impotent ultra-lefties. Dean supports responded back here.

    The green vote simply isn't important. I'm sure that more than half of those votes are permanent third-party protest votes and regardless of what the Dems want you to think it was a bad ballot and a piss-poor Gore campaign that got Bush into office.

    Regardless, everyone who isn't in the GOP wants an electable Democrat. I can't see why Dean wouldn't fit the bill, especially with Iraq turing out to be a quite the quagmire for Bush.

    Sorry, but there's no ploy. Dean is fighting influencial (read: very wealthy and very connected) members of his own party right now and in interesting ways (appeal to the populace, net-based action, etc) just to get heard.

  10. Social Security by ClarkEvans · · Score: 3, Interesting

    xI'm convined that Social Security is the biggest scam in the history of mankind. Think about it. What other scam has screwed hundreds of millions of people out of 15% of their life's income only to give them a piddly amount back if/when the retire?

    Social Security is above all a "saftey net" so that children without both parents and those who are no longer productive (elderly) can be housed, clothed, and fed. It is really _not_ a retirement plan. It is a mechanism to prevent widespread poverty.

    Social Security is a generational transfer, that is, you pay for the generation of your parents and grandparents (and disadvantaged children) for the society they have built. It has *nothing* to do with retirement, the money isn't locked in a box and isn't invested and isn't saved (although it is often used in the general fund as regular tax money...)

    Social Security is an extra tax (15%) paid by the working class (after 80K you don't owe any more social security) so that the very wealthy don't have to shoulder the burden of those who are not yet (children w/o parent) or are no longer (elderly) productive members of society. In times where the take-in is very high and the pay-out is very low (the last 10 years), it is a *huge* boon to the very wealthy since the money collected goes directly into the treasury; with it in the calculation the average tax rate of your middle-income american is *far higher* than those in the million dollar brackets...

    If one were to be fair about use of Social Security money, extra money should be used exclusively for the education of the children who later on will have to support you... ie, if you arn't spending it on those in retirement, it should be spent making sure that the next generation is educated enough to compete in the global marketplace so that they (collectivly) can provide the security net for you and your generation. Use of this money for the military and other general spending is a severe abuse of the whole idea.

    So. I half agree with you. Social security is a scam to increase the effective tax rate of the middle and lower class with respect to the upper class. And that politicians talk about it as a "retirement account" is absolutely nonsense.

    However, it has its purpose. And without social security really awful things would be common in our society... children w/o parents starving and those who have built our roads, infrastructure, and other societial assets being left in the streets to die... ick.

    1. Social Security is meant as a humane way to handle those in society who are not yet productive (children /w missing parents) and who have past their productive stage (the eldery).

    2. Social Security is a saftey net since

    1. Social Security is nothing more than an extra 15% tax on those who make 80K or less Social Security is _not_ a retirement plan, money is not saved nor are you necessarly gaurenteed to get that money at any point; it is extra tax... tax that the wealthy don't pay.

    The first thing to note is that Social Security is _not_ a retirement plan. The current generation pays for the previous generation.

  11. Bush lite? by Heisenbug · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I haven't seen anything 'lite' about Dean. Whenever I actually look into his stance on an issue, I find that he's thought it through very carefully, and that he seems to be taking a principled stand -- while being open to discussion. He doesn't go for the simple answer -- he goes for one that makes sense to him, whether or not it looks good. It helps that I agree with many of his stances, once I understand them -- but it helps even more that I respect the way he thinks and speaks. That's one way that he comes in way beyond Bush in my book.

    But the important thing is that his views usually make more sense once you look into them. For example, he's often labeled as 'pro-gun' -- because he thinks that Vermont, with roughly 3 murders a year, should have a different set of gun laws than New York. That's not entirely crazy, is it?

    I've looked into a few other issues that you name:

    "Pro-choice, but refuses to make Roe v. Wade a litmus test for federal judges."

    I read that interview. Basically, he was saying that he would assess judges based on a wide array of issues, of which abortion was just one. Are you saying Dean is like Bush because he refuses to take a simplistic stance? Come on ...

    "Kyoto treaty
    Says we must "take another look," but has "concerns" about some provisions."

    Specifically, that the treaty might go too easy on third-world pollution. Is that too soft on the environment for you?

    "Patriot Act
    Would repeal "parts," but also wants to expand intelligence agencies; praises Russ Feingold as only Senator who opposed the act, ignoring Kucinich's vocal House opposition, falsely implying no other candidate opposed the Patriot Act"

    It is unfortunate that the House Democrats are so underplayed in general -- but now are you saying Dean is like Bush because he's going to apply standards of constitutionality to the Patriot act?

    "Medical marijuana
    Firmly opposed, although promises to abide by a proposed FDA evaluation."

    So he's going to overcome his own prejudices, and apply the same standards of medicine to marijuana that are applied to other drugs. Shocked, shocked am I.

    "Bush would be delighted to run against Dean who is simply a watered down version of Bush."

    I simply don't buy that. Gore was watered down, the middle-of-the-road boring candidate. That seems to be what the Democratic Party wants again -- and I agree with you that such a candidate wouldn't stand a chance against Bush.

    But Dean comes across as honest, intelligent, daring, and willing to take principled stands. He's neither boring nor, as you suggest, conservative. Although I think you've nailed the problem the democratic party faces, Dean is the solution and not the problem.