Undernews For June 10, 2010

Undernews For June 10, 2010

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WORD

The problem with doing nothing is not knowing when you're finished. - Ben Franklin

When the country was debating the economic-stimulus plan, policy makers asked economists for advice, and the press frequently provided a forum for them to express their opinions. Yet when discussing education, the experts -- those who work with children every day in classrooms -- are rarely consulted.. . . It seems to me that if this is a genuine concern, those who best understand the challenges and problems in our schools, namely teachers, should be asked what they think. - Emily Miller, 2nd grade teacher, Brooklyn

MORNING LINE

Sam Smith - The present and former Democratic presidents of the United States actively challenged the major labor union-backed candidate for US Senator from Arkansas. And then they bragged about it when their own candidate won. A senior White House official told Politico's Ben Smith, "Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet on a pointless exercise,"

Not too long ago, this would have been - for a Democratic official - a criminal offense. But the contemporary Democratic Party's list of periodic targets includes not only labor unions but school teachers (Race to the Top), seniors (the assault on Medicare and Social Security), the middle class (saving banks but not soon-to be-foreclosed homes), the young (jailed for minor drug offenses and sent, sometimes repeatedly, to fight in useless wars) and civil liberties (wiretapping and other constitutional attacks).

In short, it is fair to say that the Democratic Party now treats as foes, or with contempt, many of the very constituencies that led to its periods of greatness.

HOW TO WIN IN ARKANSAS

Rob Kall, Op Ed News - Garland County Arkansas was the county that gave Bill Halter his biggest "bolus" of votes. Firedoglake reports that three percent of the total votes for him in last month's three way race. There were 42 polling places open last month. For Tuesday's race, only two polling places were opened. There were 12,000 voters last month.

In addition, early voting was not made available to Garland County voters. These decisions were made by a voting commission run by party Democrats.

A lawsuit has been filed, claiming the Garland County voting commission intentionally closed the 40 polling sites for, "the purpose of disenfranchising " minority, elderly, poor and disabled voters in the county. It also says that "the greater part of the voting electorate are unable to find or reach" the polling places and are "thereby deprived of their right to vote and were disenfranchised."

Apparently, Politics Daily reports, this is not the first time this happened. They did the same kind of thing in 2008.

Politics daily also reports, "The suit filed Tuesday asks the court to stop the certification of the votes and challenges the validity of the runoff election. Once votes are certified in Arkansas, 10 days after an election, it is almost impossible to challenge them."

FEDS WITHHELD OIL FLOW ESTIMATES

Tim Dickinson, Rolling Stone - Even after the president's press conference, Rolling Stone has learned, the administration knew the spill could be far worse than its "best estimate" acknowledged. That same day, the president's Flow Rate Technical Group – a team of scientists charged with establishing the gusher's output – announced a new estimate of 12,000 to 25,000 barrels, based on calculations from video of the plume. In fact, according to interviews with team members and scientists familiar with its work, that figure represents the plume group's minimum estimate. The upper range was not included in their report because scientists analyzing the flow were unable to reach a consensus on how bad it could be. "The upper bound from the plume group, if it had come out, is very high," says Timothy Crone, a marine geophysicist at Columbia University who has consulted with the government's team. "That's why they had resistance internally. We're talking 100,000 barrels a day."

The median figure for Crone's independent calculations is 55,000 barrels a day – the equivalent of an Exxon Valdez every five days. "That's what the plume team's numbers show too," Crone says. A source privy to internal discussions at one of the world's top oil companies confirms that the industry privately agrees with such estimates. "The industry definitely believes the higher-end values," the source says. "That's accurate – if not more than that." The reason, he adds, is that BP appears to have unleashed one of the 10 most productive wells in the Gulf. "BP screwed up a really big, big find," the source says. "And if they can't cap this, it's not going to blow itself out anytime soon."

Alabama Live - A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration video, shot as officials coordinated response to the Deepwater Horizon disaster, shows that federal officials almost immediately worried that the oil well could leak up to 110,000 barrels per day, or 4.6 million gallons. The video appears on a federal Web site.

It was filmed in Seattle, at NOAA's Western Regional Center, as scientists and federal officials in Seattle, Houston and New Orleans engaged in telephone conferences, according to a companion document on the Web site. .

In one scene, officials say that the estimate for the leak in a worst-case scenario is between 65,000 and 100,000 barrels per day. A dry erase board on the wall reads "Estim: 64,000 to 110,000 bbls/day. CNN reported 300,000 gal/day."

The high end of the estimate, 110,000 barrels, is about 4.6 million gallons. At that spill rate, 32 million gallons of oil would enter the Gulf every week. By comparison, the entire Exxon Valdez spill was about 11 million gallons.

Officials estimate current flow from the damaged well at 210,000 gallons a day.

It is unclear from the video what events would have to transpire to raise the flow rate higher.

BLAGOVILLE UPDATE

Back in 2005, then Senator Barack Obama worked out a real estate deal, buying a Georgian revival mansion for $1.65 mllion on the same day as Tony Rezko bought the next door undeveloped lot. Later, Obama paid Rezko $104,000 to increase the size of his side yard. What made the deal odd, as one news account put it, was that "The transaction occurred at a time when it was widely known Tony Rezko was under investigation by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald and as other Illinois politicians befriended by Rezko distanced themselves from him."

When the deal was exposed, Obama was typically succinct: "With respect to the purchase of my home, I am confident that everything was handled ethically and above board. But I regret that while I tried to pay close attention to the specific requirements of ethical conduct, I misgauged the appearance presented by my purchase of the additional land from Mr. Rezko."

Now, in the Blagojevich trial, Rezko's name is coming up again. Blago's former chief of staff, talking to cut prison time, has testified that Rezko gave him as much as $90,000 while he was on the job. It started about a year before the Obama-Rezko deal at Alonzo Monk's wedding, where he gave Monk $10,000 in cash and it kept coming. Monk said he never told Blago about the deal: "I didn't think Blagojevich would approve of the cash payments because it would put us both in jeopardy.".

FEDERAL COURT ALLOWS NY POLICE TO KEEP DETAILS OF ITS 2004 CRIMINAL CONVENTION RAMPAGE SECRET

NY Times - A panel of federal judges ruled that New York City can keep secret about 1,800 pages of records detailing the Police Department’s surveillance and tactical strategy in advance of protests at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York.

In reversing a lower court decision, the three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit sided with the department’s position that releasing the documents could compromise future surveillance efforts, including those centered on terrorism suspects.

The ruling appears to end a battle over the documents that lasted more than three years and comes amid a case that represents the largest legal challenge to the powers extended to the police since the Sept. 11 attack. Initially, the issue was full disclosure of evidence amid depositions in federal lawsuits brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union against the city.

The intelligence documents and filings sought by the group detailed the work of undercover officers sent all over the world by the Police Department to collect information on people who planned to demonstrate at the 2004 convention.

Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said the court had “wisely recognized the fundamental importance to public safety of protecting undercover identities and maintaining the integrity of their methods.”

More than 1,800 people were arrested and fingerprinted during the convention, but lawyers for the civil liberties group, representing some of those arrested, were seeking the documents to see how and why arrests were made and what information the police may have had before they made the arrests.

Christopher T. Dunn, the associate legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said it was a mistake to conflate the department’s antiterrorism efforts with its operation to covertly observe groups involved in public protests at political events.

Mr. Dunn said he was concerned that the police would use the decision to clamp down on peaceful protests in New York.

“What has been so deeply troubling has been the city’s continued effort to depict demonstrators as terrorists,” Mr. Dunn said. “The convention protests were entirely peaceful, and we believe that the reports we sought would have revealed that the Police Department was fully aware that the protests would be peaceful.”

Mr. Dunn added, “The real tragedy in today’s ruling is that it may further embolden the police to play the terrorism card in trying to suppress lawful protest.”

A TEACHER WRITES NJ GOVERNOR CHRISTIE

I am the enemy. I never realized this until your election to governor.In a few short weeks, you have made this fact explicitly clear to me. A large portion of your budget address was about my profession, and how we have caused the problems this state now faces. I want to thank you for opening my eyes to this fact. However, I am not sure I understand how I am the problem or how I have caused the state to be in such debt.

I have been teaching in our public school system for 9 years. I started at $36,000 a year. My college roommate started as an office worker at an accounting firm for $75,000. It was the same year. He told me he mostly made copies and plugged numbers into a computer. I was designing lesson plans, teaching classes of 30+ students, some of whom had problems with drug abuse, crime, and depression. After nine years experience I made $52,000 last year. I would like to point out that this is $8,000 less than your "media relations" person. You know, the 25 year old who runs your Twitter and Facebook accounts. My college roommate? He makes double what I do now. We both have bachelor's degrees. But what do I know? I am the problem.

You tell the people of New Jersey that we teachers get a free ride on the pension "gravy train". Well, I contribute to my pension. It has been deducted from every paycheck I have ever received. Thousands. You do not contribute to my pension even though it is legally and contractually required. You have lied to the people of New Jersey and your refusal to pay the pension just puts off the inevitable. Leave the problem for the next generation, I suppose. . .

During my time as a teacher, I have volunteered many late hours. Although you seem to think all I care about is me, me, me, I have coached girl's powder-puff football for nothing. I have chaperoned school dances, plays, and fundraisers. I have worked the concession stand at football games. I wasn't paid for any of this. I have bought hundreds of dollars worth of shirts, cookie dough, pizzas and countless other items I didn't really need because I wanted to help support my students and their activities. I have "canned" at football games to help needy students, stayed late waiting for parents to pick up kids who missed their busses, and bought classes pizzas and breakfast to reward them for their excellence. I cooked a class eggs and waffles once because they brought in over 500 canned goods for our local homeless shelter. I have been in a dunk tank not once, but twice to raise funds for my school. I have taken pies to the face and almost had to kiss a ram, all for my students. My coworker and I once organized a pancake breakfast for a student battling cancer. We and many of our colleagues, whom you demean, were at school at 4:30 in the morning to prepare pancakes for a school of over 2,000 students. We raised over ten thousand dollars for that student. I never asked once, "What is in it for me?"

You have declared open season on teachers. You have made us the bane of New Jersey?s existence. . .Teachers are lazy, overpaid, under-worked. We are whiners. I guess that is what I am doing right now. You have made it okay to bash us. Some of the public are rejoicing that my colleagues will lose their jobs. Until you opened my eyes and opened their mouths, I never realized what a terrible person I was.

When I decided to study education in college my mother warned me that I had better not teach unless it was a passion. She told me if I just wanted summers off I wouldn't last. She was a teacher herself. She said I could get paid better doing other things. She told me my efforts would not be appreciated, that it was only a matter of time before politics made us the enemy again. I didn't listen. Teaching was a calling for me, and I thought that even though I wouldn't be paid a lot, at least I would have good benefits, a pension, and job security. What a fool I was. I thought I was doing the right thing, helping kids, improving society. Turns out the whole time I was none of these things. I was the enemy. I was the problem. My own government has forsaken me; my own community would like to banish me. For the first time in my career, I am questioning my decision, feeling my passion diminish.

Thank you for showing me the light. My only hope is that the next generation does not see the light, and does not listen to you, because if they do there will be no more problems like me, there will be no public education. You will have won your war against the middle and lower class. You will create a society where the rich get educated and the poor do not. But then again, what do I know? I am the problem.

Sincerely,

Steven Denon

The writer is A 2007 Nominee for the Governor's Teacher of the Year Award.

REVIEW COMMISSION ATTACKS AIG BAILOUT

Politico - A new report by the panel created to oversee spending under the Troubled Asset Relief Program blasts the Federal Reserve and the Treasury for creating the too-big-to-fail problem with its handling of the AIG crisis in 2008.

The Congressional Oversight Panel report condemns government officials for the initial September 2008 decision, backed by then-Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, to save the company from collapse by lending it $85 billion in taxpayer funds from the Federal Reserve to save the insurance behemoth. While the loans from the Treasury and Fed eventually grew to over $200 billion, the report aims it fire at the initial decision to bail out AIG, rather than letting it fail.

"The government’s actions in rescuing AIG continue to have a poisonous effect on the marketplace," the report says. "The AIG rescue demonstrated that Treasury and the Federal Reserve would commit taxpayers to pay any price and bear any burden to prevent the collapse of America‘s largest financial institutions and to assure repayment to the creditors doing business with them."

Read more
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MINORITIES COULD BE A MAJORITY BY MID CENTURY

Huffington Post - The nation's minority population is steadily rising and now makes up 35 percent of the United States, advancing an unmistakable trend that could render them the new American majority by midcentury.New Census estimates for 2009 show minorities added 2.5 percent, or 107.2 million people, boosted by a surge in Hispanic births and more people who described themselves as multiracial. During this time, the white population remained flat, making up roughly 199.9 million, or 65 percent, of the country.

In 2000, whites comprised 79 percent of the total population and minorities 21 percent.
Currently four states – Hawaii, New Mexico, California and Texas – as well as the District of Columbia have minority populations that exceeded 50 percent.

Among the individual races, Hispanics grew by 3.1 percent to 48.4 million and Asians increased 2.5 percent to 13.7 million. They now represent about 15.8 percent and 4.5 percent of the U.S. population, respectively. Blacks, who make up about 12.3 percent of the population, increased less than 1 percent last year to 37.7 million.

Online: http://www.census.gov

JUDGE TELL BLAGO: NO TWEETING IN MY COURTROOM

The Hill - A federal judge on Tuesday ordered former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich not to tweet in court during his corruption trial. The flamboyant Blagojevich (D) - who was removed from office last year - had planned to live-tweet his trial under the handle @governorrod, which was created earlier this month

WHO IS ALVIN GREENE?

Mother Jones - An unemployed 32-year-old black Army veteran with no campaign funds, no signs, and no website shocked South Carolina on Tuesday night by winning the Democratic Senate primary to oppose Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC). Alvin Greene, who currently lives in his family's home, defeated Vic Rawl, a former judge and state legislator who had a $186,000 campaign warchest and had already planned his next fundraising event. Despite the odds, Greene, who has been unemployed for the past nine months, said that he wasn't surprised by his victory. . .

Greene insists that he paid the $10,400 filing fee and all other campaign expenses from his own personal funds. "It was 100 percent out of my pocket. I’m self-managed. It’s hard work, and just getting my message to supporters. I funded my campaign 100 percent out of my pocket and self-managed," said Greene, who sounded anxious and unprepared to speak to the public. . .

The oddity of Greene’s candidacy has already prompted speculation from local media about whether he might be a Republican plant. But Greene denies that Republicans or anyone else had approached him about running. "No, no¬no one approached me. This is my decision," he said. A 13-year military veteran, he says he had originally gotten the idea in 2008 when he was serving in Korea. "I just saw the country was in bad shape two years ago…the country was declining," he says. "I wanted to make sure we continue to go up on the right track." But when asked whether there was a specific person or circumstance that precipitated his decision to jump into politics, Greene simply replied: "nothing in particular...it's just, uh, nothing in particular." South Carolina Democratic Party Chairwoman Carol Fowler speculated that Greene won because his name appeared first on the ballot, and voters unfamiliar with both candidates chose alphabetically.

Corey Hutchins, Columbia Free Times - Greene’s curious candidacy raises the question that something else might be going on. Republican place markers in Palmetto State Democratic primaries are campaign legend.

In the early ‘90s, a Republican strategist was prosecuted and forced to pay a fine when he was found to have coaxed an unemployed black fisherman into running in a primary race to increase white turnout at the polls in a Lowcountry congressional race. The political operative paid the man’s filing fee.

Greene says he’s never heard of such a thing. He says he just really wanted to run.

HELEN THOMAS' SISTERS: MEDIA GOT IT WRONG

Richard Prince, Journal-isms - The sisters of Helen Thomas say her statements about Israel - which cost the White House correspondent-turned-Hearst columnist her job - have been widely misinterpreted.

In a telephone interview with Journal-isms, three of them said Thomas was not calling for the destruction of Israel or the return of all Israelis to Europe or the United States, as has been the running narrative, but was expressing her opposition to the disputed Israeli settlements on Palestinian land.

"They should stop confiscating the land that belonged to the Palestinians. We feel that there should be a two-state solution in Palestine," said one sister, who did not want to be identified. The sisters, who spoke from the home of one of them in the Detroit area, home of the nation's largest concentration of Arab Americans, range in age from 87 to 95. Thomas is 89. A brother is 100. The family is Lebanese-American.

"Helen Thomas is for peaceful coexistence in the Palestinian territory," said Barbara Issac, the youngest sister. "What she does not like is that the Palestinians have been completely devastated and made to live under occupation and all the deleterious effects, and the hazardous effects of that, stripped of their ability to live normal lives.

"Helen has lived with this problem for as long as she's been in Washington," she said. Displaced Palestinians become waiters and cooks there, "and would talk to her, and she's heard nothing but their stories of horror for 60 years," referencing the creation of Israel in 1948. "She's out to dinner and they find her.

"If nobody got angry about injustice, then people just go on suffering, knowing that nobody gives a damn." . . .

Helen Thomas was not talking calls, her sisters said, giving a hint at what her life has been like in the past few days. "She has so many bouquets of flowers they can't get into her condo," Issac said. . .

Osama Siblani, publisher of the Arab-American News in Dearborn, Mich., which claims to be "the largest, oldest and most respected Arab American newspaper in the United States," told Journal-isms there was never any doubt about what Thomas meant.

"Helen Thomas hit it right on the nail. They should get the hell out of Palestine," he said. "It's illegal" -- what is taking place, he said, "confiscating land" and "illegal settlements."
"She's talking about the settlements," he said without hesitation, asked to explain Thomas' reference. . .

"She doesn't hate anybody," Isaac said. One of the older sisters recalled that during the Holocaust, Thomas closely followed first lady Eleanor Roosevelt's efforts to bring German Jews to the United States. "She was very upset about the whole thing, and she had fed them in her apartment building when I used to visit her back in the '40s. They were in the concentration camps. She's very close to all that."

SNAKES DECLINING SHARPLY IN FIVE COUNTRIES

Guardian, UK - Scientists in five countries across three continents report they found "alarming" declines in snake numbers after monitoring 17 populations in a variety of habitats – something they believe could be part of a global phenomenon.

The paper reports 11 of the population groups "declined sharply", while five remained stable, and one showed a very weak sign of increase. Many of the researchers in the UK, France, Italy, Nigeria and Australia also found evidence of "population crashes" – a sudden decline followed by no sign of recovery – a trend which would make the survivors more vulnerable to being wiped out by further pressures.

"All the declines occurred during the same relatively short period of time and over a wide geographical area that included temperate, Mediterranean and tropical climates," write the authors. "We suggest that, for these reasons alone, there is likely to be a common cause at the root of the declines and that this indicates a more widespread phenomenon."

MUSIC AND AMERICA'S CULTURE OF CONTROL

Sam Smith - As America's constitutional government, economy and culture has declined, there has been an increasing effort to revive it through control, rather than with the creativity and imagination that supported it for so long.

You can see this in the endless new laws and regulations proposed at the national, state and local level or in the sick new test tyranny of public education. But it's also in less expected corners such as the country's cultural affairs.

The efforts of the flagging music and film industries to restrict downloading or copying is a classic example. These industries have essentially put their faith in lawyers rather than artists. That both American film and music - from a creative standpoint - have ebbed from previous peaks is happily ignored by the industry and media. But the fact remains that we'll be listening to the Beatles decades after everyone's forgotten who Lady Gaga was.

But that's not stopping the lawyers who, in reality, are representing the top stars of their industry rather than all musicians.

[][] Boston Globe - Across New England, church coffeehouses, library cafes, and eateries that pass the hat to pay local musicians or open their doors to casual jam sessions are experiencing a crackdown by performance rights organizations, or PROs, which collect royalties for songwriters.

Copyright law requires that any venue where music is performed publicly, from cheerleading competitions and mortuaries to nightclubs and stadiums, have a performance license. Recorded music is subject to license fees as well. The three US-based PROs - ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC - collect the fees and distribute them to their members.

With the music industry in steep decline, PROs are ramping up their pursuit of the little guys, who acknowledge that songwriters are entitled to compensation but are angry and frustrated at what they see as unfair targeting of small businesses and nonprofits that make no money from the music they present.

Among them is Magret Gudmundsson, who until recently hosted a monthly acoustic open mike in her Middleborough cafe, Coffee Milano. “I like having it here, but we’re not making any money from it and they wanted $332 a year,’’ Gudmundsson said. “The town really needs something like this. They ruined it.’’

Performance license fees are calculated based on a variety of factors: a venue size and seating capacity, the number of musicians who perform there, and the number of live performances per week, among others. The average fee for a small coffeehouse would be $200 to $400. But owners could be required to buy licenses from all three PROs.

The PROs have been criticized for years for their aggressive stance; in the mid-1990s ASCAP bowed to public outcry after attempting to collect licensing fees from the Girl Scouts for singing campfire songs. (They now charge the scouts a symbolic $1 a year.) . . .

ASCAP files between 250 and 300 copyright infringement lawsuits a year. BMI files 100 to 200 annually, and it’s always a last resort, according to spokesman Jerry Bailey, often following years of attempts to enforce compliance with the law. [][]

Another, and wiser way to look at this, is to figure out why the underlying industry isn't doing better. And it isn't.

[]][] Glenn Peoples, Billboard - Fewer new releases are reaching one million units in sales, a very small number of them even get to 5,000 units and maintaining early sales momentum is increasingly difficult. . .

Of the 97,751 albums released in 2009, only 12 of them sold more than one million units last year, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The number of titles to reach one million units in previous years was 35 in 2006, 27 in 2007 and 22 in 2008. Clearly it is getting more difficult for an album to sell one million units. . .

Because radio plays less of a role in album sales, few albums get the lasting benefits of radio promotion that helps sales after the initial push. And because there are fewer marketing dollars being spent at physical retail, there are fewer titles enrolled in price-and-placement programs that used to position a sale-priced CD for the first two or four weeks of release.

These factors combine to create a retail environment in which it is easier to get core fans’ attention but difficult to market beyond those core fans. [][]

If you look at the recording industry's own stats, you find some startling facts. These are changes from 1999 to 2008:

- True there has been a large shift towards downloading and the Internet. In 1999, these two comprised only 2.4% of the industry's business. By 2008 it was 28%.

- But the age market has also shifted. In 1999 those under 20 constituted 21% of the business. By 2008 it was only 18%. And, in fact, in every age group until 40, the market share declined. This means the industry is relying increasingly on those born before 1960 when there were still juke boxes and people could play what they wanted in any bar in the country. The market for the 40 and older crowd has gone from 34% to 45%. That's not a good indicator for the future.

- The dollar value of the sound recording industry has declined from $14,6 billion in 1999 to $8.5 billion in 2008.

Here's another fact that gets lost in discussions of this topic, as noted by Wikipedia: "By the middle of the 1940s, three-quarters of the records produced in America went into jukeboxes. . . Towards the end of the 20th century several companies started introducing completely digital jukeboxes which did not use physical recordings. The music selection and playback system was replaced by a dedicated proprietary computer." While consumer choice was still possible, it increasingly was replaced by that of the proprietor, hence eliminating the listener as a participant.

In fact, music grows in popularity thanks in no small part to the ability of ordinary humans to share it. Between technology and the RIAA, that has become ever more difficult.

Finally, these thoughts on copyright law:

Christina Mulligan, Balkanization - While copyright holders assert that copyright violators are “stealing” their “property,” people everywhere are remixing and recreating artistic works for the very same reasons the Glee kids do - to learn about themselves, to become better musicians, to build relationships with friends, and to pay homage to the artists who came before them. . .

You might be tempted to assume that this tension isn’t a big deal because copyright holders won’t go after creative kids or amateurs. But they do: In the 1990s, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers asked members of the American Camping Association, including Girl Scout troops,to pay royalties for singing copyrighted songs at camp. In 2004, the Beatles’ copyright holders tried to prevent the release of The Grey Album – a mash-up of Jay-Z’s Black Album and the Beatles’ White Album - and only gave up after massive civil disobedience resulted in the album’s widespread distribution. Copyright holders even routinely demand that YouTube remove videos of kids dancing to popular music. While few copyright cases go to trial, copyright holders like the Recording Industry Association of America don’t hesitate to seek stratospheric damage awards when they do, as in the Jammie Thomas-Rasset filesharing case.

So what should you do in real life if you and your friends, inspired by Glee, want to make a mash-up, or a new music video for a popular song? Should you just leave this creativity to the professionals, or should you become dirty, rotten copyright violators?

Current law favors copyright holders. But morally, there’s nothing wrong with singing your heart out. Remixing isn’t stealing, and copyright isn’t property. Copyright is a privilege - actually six specific privileges - granted by the government. Back in 1834, the Supreme Court decided in Wheaton v. Peters that copyrights weren’t “property” in the traditional sense of the word, but rather entitlements the government chose to create for instrumental reasons. The scope and nature of copyright protection are policy choices - choices that have grown to favor the interests of established, rent-seeking businesses instead of the public in general.

The Constitution allows Congress to pass copyright laws to “promote the progress of science” - a word often used in the 18th century to mean “knowledge”. The stated purpose of the original 1790 copyright statute was to encourage learning. So you tell me - what promotes knowledge and learning: letting people rearrange music and learn to use a video camera, or threatening new artists with $150,000 fines?

Christina Mulligan is a visiting fellow of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. You can reach her by e-mail at cmulligan at gmail.com

GREENS CHALK ONE UP IN MAINE

An interesting thing happened in the Maine election that probably won't be reported much: The Green Independent Party found itself in alliance with the tourist and automobile repair industries to overturn a series of changes in the state tax code that would have lowered the top of the state income tax and raised sales taxes for certain things instead.

Even more interestingly, the Green cause won.

We have long argued that the Greens should make alliances with small business groups that are repeatedly ignored by the big parties which have been fully purchased by large corporations. In this case, it seems to have worked.

The issue was complicated. For example, proponents of the law argued that it would place a bigger burden on Maine's substantial tourist industry.

But the Greens and other seeking repeal argued that a flat income tax was unfair and that some of the targeted industries - like auto repair - would disproportionately affect lower income residents.

So now it's back to the drawing board. One idea to consider: add a little to the sales tax but have it effective only June to October. Then offer a refund on state personal income taxes for that amount. You get the tourist bucks without hurting residents.And if you don't want to wait for the refund, you buy your car in May or November.

WHAT NETANYAHU DOESN'T KNOW ABOUT AMERICA

Peter Beinart, Daily Beast - What Netanyahu and his acolytes seem not to understand is this: Although there are lots of Americans who will support Israeli policy no matter what, their side is not likely to wield power anytime soon. The two most important emerging forces in American politics are Hispanics, America’s largest minority group, and millennials, the most diverse generation in American history, and one larger than the baby boomers.

Both are growing inexorably as a share of the electorate. Both have tipped decisively towards the Democrats, not just in 2008, but in every election since 2004. And neither is likely to be uncritically pro-Israel. According to a 2006 survey by the Pew Research Center, only one-third of Hispanics, compared to almost half of non-Hispanic whites, say they sympathize more with Israel than the Palestinians. Given the disproportionate percentage of Hispanics and African-Americans in the millennial generation, it’s a good bet that younger voters tilt this way too.

If the Netanyahu government and its allies have a strategy for talking to these Americans - as opposed to the ones who attend the AIPAC Policy Conference or Christians United for Israel rallies - it has been well-hidden. .

Once upon a time, all this might not have mattered. In the old days when the Jewish State faced off against leaders like Yasir Arafat and Saddam Hussein, Israel’s foes could be trusted to make it look good by comparison. Today, by contrast, Israel’s most influential critic in the Middle East is Turkey, a democracy and a member of NATO. The Palestinians in the West Bank are led by Salam Fayyad, a proponent of nonviolence, a source of anti-corruption and a devotee of the Texas Longhorns.

For too long, Israeli leaders had it easy: unsympathetic enemies in the Middle East and uncritical friends in the United States. The result was hubris, a belief that Israel could do whatever it wanted, and still win the political debate in the United States. That is no longer the case.

BP: A TESTED IDEA FINALLY TAKES HOLD

The Wall Street Journal reports that "BP, which is capturing about 15,000 barrels a day from the well now, plans in the next week or so to expand its oil-containment effort by another 5,000 barrels a day, deploying another vessel already at the site of the spill. The company is also bringing in storage vessels from elsewhere in the world, including a tanker from the North Sea."

This is not a new idea, only an extremely slow one to gain traction. On May 24, we cited an Esquire article in which Mark Warren reported:

"There's a potential solution to the Gulf oil spill that neither BP, nor the federal government, nor anyone - save a couple intuitive engineers - seems willing to try. As The Politics Blog reported on Tuesday in an interview with former Shell Oil president John Hofmeister, the untapped solution involves using empty supertankers to suck the spill off the surface, treat and discharge the contaminated water, and either salvage or destroy the slick."

The whole article is worth reading not just for the details but as a reminder of how answers can be kept just as inaccessible as deep sea wells.

WHY NOT PRODUCT PLACEMENT FOR PROFESSORS?

Improbable Research - “Viewing the latest Lady Gaga video, with its ten product placements, I’m inspired by the thought: Why don’t professors do product placements, too?” wonders Eric Schwitzgebel, Professor of Philosophy at University of California at Riverside.

There are, according to the professor, many potentially lucrative and as-yet-untapped opportunities – for example to promote products such as fizzy drinks or high-fashion items during presentations, lectures, and even in academic publications. Thus he has recently made the following standing offer to prospective advertisers:

“For $2,000,000 U.S., I will give over three inches square of real estate on my check [sic], for an appropriately tasteful tattoo by a company that’s not too evil. (Evil companies will have to pay a surcharge sufficient to bring the overall utilitarian considerations back into balance.) To preserve what’s left of my dignity, I will immediately donate half the amount to Oxfam – which should, conservatively, save at least ten people’s lives.”

OBAMA REPORTED PLANNING TO USE BAGRAM AS THE NEW GITMO

Jeremny Scahill, Nation - The Obama administration is reportedly considering a plan to use Bagram prison in Afghanistan as a Guantanamo-style prison to hold and interrogate "terrorism suspects" captured in countries other than Afghanistan, including Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan. Citing unnamed US officials, The Los Angeles Times reports that the US is exploring a plan to "carve out a section of the prison for non-Afghan detainees who would remain under U.S. custody" even after Bagram is officially handed over to Afghan control, which the White House agreed to do last month. . .

In May, the International Committee of the Red Cross confirmed the existence of a secret prison facility within the larger Bagram prison complex in Afghanistan. Abuses at the so-called "black" jail were widely documented by media outlets, including the BBC and The New York Times. The jail is run by US special forces and the Defense Intelligence Agency.

CALIFORNIA VOTERS APPROVE MEASURE THAT GREATLY WEAKENS THIRD PARTIES

LA Times - For the third time in 12 years, Californians opted to change the way they select candidates for local, state and federal office with the passage of Proposition 14.

Under the new measure, only the top two vote-getters in a primary election -- regardless of their political party -- will advance to a November runoff. Currently, the top vote-getter in each party advances to the fall campaign.

The changes will not affect presidential contests.

Supporters of the law say it will lead to the election of more moderate legislators. Opponents say the change will make campaigns more expensive and decimate smaller political parties.

California voters passed a similar measure in 1996, only to have it overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court. Voters reaffirmed their support for closed, partisan primaries in 2004.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was among the leading supporters, and fundraisers, for Proposition 14.

SUPREME COURT BOWS TO BIG BUCKS AGAIN

NY Times editorial - In a burst of judicial activism, the Supreme Court on Tuesday upended the gubernatorial race in Arizona, cutting off matching funds to candidates participating in the state’s public campaign finance system. Suddenly, three candidates, including Gov. Jan Brewer, can no longer receive public funds they had counted on to run against a free-spending wealthy opponent.

The court’s reckless order muscling into the race was terse and did not say whether there were any dissents, though it is hard to imagine there were not. An opinion explaining its reasoning will have to wait until the next term, assuming it takes the case, but by that time the state’s general election will be over and its model campaign finance system substantially demolished.

It seems likely that the Roberts court will use this case to continue its destruction of the laws and systems set up in recent decades to reduce the influence of big money in politics. By the time it is finished, millionaires and corporations will have regained an enormous voice in American politics, at the expense of candidates who have to raise money the old-fashioned way and, ultimately, at the expense of voters.

Arizona’s clean elections program was established by the state’s voters in 1998 after a series of scandals provided clear illustrations of money’s corrupting influence. In particular, the program was prompted by the AzScam scandal of 1991, in which many state legislators were recorded accepting contributions and bribes in exchange for approval of gambling legislation.

The system gives qualifying candidates a lump-sum grant for their primary or general election races in exchange for which the candidates agree not to raise large private contributions. If an opposing candidate is not participating in the system and spends more than the lump-sum grant, the participating candidate qualifies for additional matching funds.

It was those matching funds that produced a challenge from well-financed candidates, backed by the Goldwater Institute and other conservative interests. The candidates argued that the matching funds “chilled” their freedom of speech because they were afraid to spend more than the limit that triggered the funds. A lower court agreed with that pretzel logic, but last month a panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit disagreed. It said the speech of the plaintiffs had not been chilled. “The essence of this claim is not that they have been silenced,” the panel said, “but that the speech of their opponents has been enabled.”

In 2008, the Supreme Court eliminated the Millionaires’ Amendment, which let Congressional candidates raise more money when running against candidates who pay for their own campaigns. In January, in the Citizens United case, the court eliminated limits to campaign spending by corporations. Both cases cited the First Amendment rights of the wealthy, and in that depressing sequence, state finance programs would be the court’s next conquest.

If the court pushes on with its chainsaw, cutting down programs that trigger matching funds, it would threaten systems in Connecticut and Maine, and judicial-race financing systems in Wisconsin, North Carolina and elsewhere. It might even shake New York City’s system, which provides higher matching funds when a well-financed opponent does not participate in the system. Candidates with no prospect of matching funds would be reluctant to join a system that limits their spending. Unless the court veers from its determined path, there will be no limit to the power of a big bankbook on politics.

SENIOR WHITE HOUSE OFFICIAL TRASHES LABOR

Ben Smith, Politico - A senior White House official just called me with a very pointed message for the administration's sometime allies in organized labor, who invested heavily in beating Blanche Lincoln, Obama's candidate, in Arkansas.

"Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet on a pointless exercise," the official said. "If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November."

Lincoln relied heavily both on Obama's endorsement, which she advertised relentlessly on radio and in the mail, and on the backing of former President Bill Clinton, who backed her to the hilt.

Lincoln foe Bill Halter had the unstinting support of the AFL-CIO, SEIU, AFSCME and other major unions. And labor officials Tuesday evening were already working to spin the narrow loss of their candidate, Bill Halter, as a moral victory, but the cost in money and in the goodwill of the White House may be a steep price to pay for a near miss.

UPDATE: AFL-CIO spokesman Eddie Vale responds that "labor isn't an arm of the Democratic Party."

WORTHLESS GOSSIP INTELLIGENT READERS WON'T CLICK ON

• LARRY KING's WIFE ATTEMPTED SUICIDE

• WHY PRINCE WILLIAM & KATE HELD OFF MARRIAGE ANNOUNCEMNT

• WHAT LADY GAGA WORE FOR HER SISTER'S HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION

• JORAN VAN DER SLOOT AND THE FBI

• GORE'S DAUGHTER ALSO DIVORCING

SHOP TALK

Sam Smith - A search of our files came up with at least 95 mentions of the Politics & Prose Bookstore. Part of this was pure self interest. I had three books launched there and my wife just had one. But it was also because the store has been a major cultural icon of the capital. Thus news that it is up for sale brings some real sadness because Carla Cohen and Barbara Meade did such a wonderful job, right on down to the sandwiches and coffee in the basement. It wasn't just about the books; it was about the role that books can play to make even a power-obsessed city more human and about its status as a refuge of sanity, decency, wisdom and comfort in an often otherwise hard and indifferent place.

FURTHERMORE. . .

Baseline Scenario - Patrick McGeehan at the New York Times recently wrote about a New York Fed study finding that studying economics makes you a Republican. The headline conclusion is that the more economics classes you take, the more likely you are to be a Republican. Majoring in economics or business is also more likely to make you a Republican.

Yahoo - While there is broad support for legalizing medical marijuana, and increasing support for general legalization, only four-in-ten American adults say they have tried marijuana. The majority (58%), however, say they have never smoked the illegal drug. More men (48%) than women (31%) say they have tried marijuana. Young adults, ages 18 to 29, are the most likely to have smoked marijuana (49%), but all Americans younger than age 65 -- adults ages 30 to 49 (47%) and adults ages 50 to 64 (42%) -- are nearly as likely to have tried marijuana. Democrats (41%) are more likely to have tried marijuana than Republicans (32%) -- though independents are the most likely (44%) -- and the religiously unaffiliated (59%) are far more likely than white evangelical Protestants (28%) to have smoked. There is not, however, much difference along income, education or geographical lines with regard to having ever smoked marijuana.

Rules of Thumb - When staying in a hotel use the side of bed that does not have the phone. The mattress will be firmer and less used.
Rob Young

GALLERY: ONE FAMILY OVER 30 YEARS -

On June 13th every year, my family goes through a private ritual: we photograph ourselves to stop, for a fleeting moment, the arrow of time passing by - Diego Goldberg, Buenos Aires, Argentina

• CUBAN HEALTHCARE: BETTER THAN AMERICA'S AT A FRACTION OF THE COST

• RETIRED GENERAL: "WE HAVE TO ACCEPT THE FACT THAT WE DID TORTURE PEOPLE"

• AYN RAND: GLENN BECK IN PRINT

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