

Throwing Hollywood under the bus could pay dividends for GOP - evo_9
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/throwing-hollywood-under-the-bus-could-pay-dividends-for-gop.ars

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joejohnson
Wow. I did not realize Al Franken was a PIPA co-sponsor.

<http://sopatrack.com/congressperson/F000457-sen-al-franken>

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icarus_drowning
The big takeaway from this isn't that the GOP is a knee-jerk anti-hollywood,
anti-SOPA party. Indeed, there are plenty of people in the conservative
establishment who were either supportive of or mute on SOPA and SOPA-like
legislation prior to blackout day, and who changed not out of principle, but
practicality.

But this does highlight the fact that our overly-simplified view of political
parties in the United States as monolithic entities of zombie-politicians who
take marching orders from the party establishment is quite out of step with
the reality, particularly where conservatives are concerned. The GOP is a
surprisingly diverse political entity, accepting the likes of Ron Paul on one
extreme and George W. Bush on the other. Indeed, in the "center", it can often
be difficult to tell the difference between "moderates" of either party.

All of which is to say, it is often unwise to make sweeping statements about
large political entities simply because prominent politicians within that
movement are vocal about a particular issue. Often the fight within a large
political party is as heated as the battles with other political parties.
Savvy voters would do well to recognize that fact.

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Natsu
I would hate to see this become a partisan issue. There are plenty of people
on every side who hate this crap.

~~~
binarybits
Obviously, the best situation would be for majorities in both parties to be
against this stuff. But a world where Republicans are against it and Dems are
for it is much better than the world we've had for the last few years, in
which both parties were on Hollywood's side.

~~~
nextparadigms
Hopefully the Democrats will fail to promote their restrictions to the
younger/more liberal crowd.

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driverdan
Isn't it about time for people in our industry to admit they're libertarian
and vote (and donate) that way?

Both parties are against our interests. Conservatives are for maintaining the
status quo which is the opposite of what we do. Both parties cater to special
interests, in this case placing democrats against us.

If our industry started putting votes and money behind a third party that let
us do what we do best and left us alone (aka Libertarians) we'd be much better
off.

~~~
maratd
> Isn't it about time for people in our industry to admit they're libertarian
> and vote (and donate) that way?

Yes!

> If our industry started putting votes and money behind a third party

No!

For you to win in the general election with 3 parties, you'd need to muster at
least a third of the vote.

That's a lot of people!

For you to win a primary of a major party, you would need to muster the vote
of a fourth of the voting populace. Actually, it's even lower than that, since
many don't affiliate themselves with a party and out of those, many don't vote
in primaries. On top of that, you can end the primary early as long as you
kill off your opponents in a few early states.

So it's _much_ easier to take over an existing party (like the GOP) than to
create a third. On top of that, all those conservatives you don't like ...
well, they'll vote for your guy now. Because they have a choice of two and
they like your guy more.

Ron Paul is doing it right. That's the only way a libertarian _leaning_ pol
will ever get close to the presidency.

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Iv
So is the way of politics.

But arguably now that most of the people who usually vote dems for other
reasons take SOPA/PIPA seriously, the only dem candidates that will stand a
chance will be people taking their money outside MPAA/RIAA

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nextparadigms
While this may work in the short term, this is exactly what I was worried
about - for Internet freedom to become a partisan issue - with some standing
to defend Internet freedom, and others wanted to restrict it. Because that
means that eventually a party or a candidate will be elected to implement
those restrictions. That would be an awful outcome, and I hope we can maintain
Internet freedom as bi-partisan, or better yet, non-partisan.

~~~
tomjen3
Don't worry. Take a look at abortion -- there is a lot of talk about it in DC,
but even those who are against it don't pass legislation, because if they did
they wouldn't have that to yell about.

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ifearthefeds
There are other parties. If you don't want to vote for Republicans or
Democrats, then _don't_.

~~~
muuh-gnu
Instead of spending time and effort to persuade people to throw their votes
away, spend time and effort changing the voting system so that voting for
third parties isnt as futile as FPTP. In the European parliament, the members
belong to approx 160 different parties. In the US, you have 2. It has been
known for a long time that FPTP converges to 2 (Duverger's law). It makes no
sense to keep FPTP but then make voters responsible for the unhealthy
situation that emerges from it and persuade them to change their voting
behaviour knowing that it makes no sense for them to change it.

~~~
stfu
But please don't use the European structure as an example for a democratic
system. The European Commission (who are the core authority for proposing
legislation) is not a democratically elected body but an "appointed" entity by
the Council - a Council that up until the Lisbon Treaty wasn't even required
to hold their meetings in public.

~~~
muuh-gnu
I was comparing the US and the EU because of a similar size. When you have 160
parties representing the views of 500 Million Europeans, it is very unlikely
that having merely 2 parties representing the views of 300 million Americans
is a natural, healthy state of affairs. The EU is of course not a role model
for democracy, but it shows that the lack of diversity in US politics can not
be a natural outcome of US voting habits. The lack of diversity (and thus lack
of democracy) is fully intentional.

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kstenerud
Great! Now if the Republicans also cut their ties to religion and stopped
wasting so much money on war zones, they could become a party worth voting
for.

~~~
nextparadigms
Seeing how all candidates besides Ron Paul, and I would think a big part of
the Republican party right now wants more laws like the Patriot Act, defending
the Internet seems completely incompatible with the current Republican party.
Sure, they used to be about limited Government and all that, but I don't think
that's really their core anymore. If they do this, it will be purely a
political play. But who knows, maybe this will give the opportunity to some
people who actually believe in this to rise up in the party. But ultimately,
I'd still hate for this to become a partisan issue. Both - or all - parties
should want Internet freedom.

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ChristianMarks
The Republicans found out that the computing hardware and software industry is
economically significant, whereas the so-called premium content industry is
not.

I quote from <http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/sssca3.html>

"According to the RIAA, the value of all CD's, live presentations, music
videos, dvds in 1998 (from <http://www.riaa.com/pdf/md_riaa10yr.pdf>) was
13.72 billion US$.

According to the SOI, in 1998 the business receipts of the computer and
electronic product manufacturing including both hardware and software (they do
not divide it further) was 560.27 billion US$. This of course excludes the
value of all the data stored on computers."

Also, Silicon Valley's business model depends on public trust of the cloud. As
David K. Levine points out, SOPA/PIPA undermines public trust in the cloud, so
Silicon Valley was right to oppose it. The choice is between supporting an
industry in decline that turns to government for protection from competition,
versus supporting a dynamic industry where the incentive is to grow
businesses.

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DanielBMarkham
I'm a political junkie, but I'm also a long-time HNer; I urge caution with
stories like this.

As an systems architect and somebody who consults with large technology
organizations, I am extremely interested in how systems of people interact --
hence the political junkie thing. But as part of watching that interaction,
I've noted that we all we have a tendency to become very tribal, especially
when the topic of our favorite "teams" come up.

So yes, I think it's very important to learn facts like the number of
Republicans that jumped ship and the fact that Al Franken was a sponsor of the
bill. Just like it's important to know that many members of the Democrat party
hang on to the idea of the bill and that the administration was in support of
it before they jumped ship as well. These are facts -- if you care about
PIPA/SOPA you should know this.

But once we move into political analysis, which side is doing what for which
reasons, I think the article becomes much more shaky as a topic for HN.
Whether or not one party may benefit or not touches directly on what you
already think of each party, so the comment thread could end up with just so
much posturing.

As a libertarian, to me the interesting things are 1) that both parties
supported the bills by large margins (or they wouldn't have been reported out
of committee) until they got caught and 2) many years ago there was some
general bipartisan agreement to freaking leave the internet alone. I'd like to
know what happened to that. But because that's going to be a "team story"
that's probably a topic for a different board besides HN.

~~~
maratd
> many years ago there was some general bipartisan agreement to freaking leave
> the internet alone. I'd like to know what happened to that.

It wasn't a threat at that point. It was a novelty. It's easy to agree to
leave a novelty alone. It's difficult when it's threatening the revenue stream
of the guys lining your pockets.

> that both parties supported the bills by large margins (or they wouldn't
> have been reported out of committee) until they got caught

Look, as much as we want to believe that our representatives actually _read_
the stuff they're pushing, the truth is, they don't. I would be shocked if a
singe member of the _committee_ responsible for the bill actually read the
damn thing. Each of them is on quite a few other committees, responsible for
quite a few other bills, have speaking engagements, businesses, books they're
writing, etc etc.

They decide on what to vote for and push based on who's supporting it. Some
members of the GOP saw the Chamber of Commerce as a supporter and jumped on
board. Commerce = Business = Good. Seriously, that was the thought process.

Once they saw the push-back, they realized things were more complicated than
that, and dropped support.

Can the GOP be a strong ally for leaving the Internet alone? Absolutely. As
long as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, etc. line their pockets right before
re-election time. If that happens, I promise you, they'll vote for whatever
bill the "Internet" endorses. Without reading it. It's a promise.

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davidw
This article crosses the line for me. I'm tired of largely redundant SOPA
articles in any event, and one that gets into broader political trends is one
step too far.

<https://twitter.com/#!/patio11/status/161131025097961475>

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balloot
This is idiotic. Silicon Valley and all the surrounding areas vote
overwhelmingly Democratic. One stupid piece of legistation doesn't overcome
the fact that the GOP are science-hating religious zealots. Republicans have a
LOT of work to do before many people in this region would even consider a vote
for them.

~~~
potater
I'm not sure I agree that it is idiotic. Certainly the GOP's track record on
neutrality is abhorrent, but if the Republicans successfully turn this into a
partisan issue where they are against and the dems are for, those who
typically vote democrat and also support the internet will be faced with a
decision in regard to what issue(s) take priority and who will be rewarded
with the vote.

Keep in mind that a republican does't necessarily have to get a democrat's
vote to come out ahead in this case. All it takes is for the democratic voter
to be so disgusted with his party's position that he either votes third party
or doesn't vote at all.

I despise the idea of it becoming a for & against partisan issue because of
the swell of support that would ultimately result in, but it could be
politically effective in an evil-ish way.

~~~
jacoblyles
I'm against net neutrality because I don't want to give the FCC any additional
powers over content transmission on the internet. I may change my mind if the
ISPs start flagrantly abusing their market position. But right now the net
neutrality advocates are touting a solution in search of a problem.

