Intellectual Property Law

The only vision is backward-looking

By Susan Crawford

So I’ve spent more time with the McCain tech plan today.

At a time when this country is suffering economically and looking for fundamental change, it looks as if Sen. McCain is in the back office having lunch with a bunch of accountants.

The heavy emphasis in the policy on tax cuts seems designed to appeal to people who equate lower taxes with progress.  Haven’t we already had years of that kind of approach?

Where’s the vision?  There’s no protection for *new* businesses from the depredations of the increasingly-powerful carriers who control internet access in this country.  The policy is all about deal-making with the major forces the Senator is used to - “rewarding companies that offer high-speed Internet access services to low income customers by allowing these companies to offset their tax liability for the cost of this service,” “encourage private investment to facilitate the build-out of infrastructure.”

We tried this deal-making for years, and it’s been a disaster.  We need leadership to get ourselves out of this mess, and as far as I can tell John McCain isn’t offering that.

There’s almost too much to say about the back-of-the-handedness of this policy, so I’ll stop here.  This isn’t vision.  It’s more like a wistful memoir about times gone by.

Full post as published by Susan Crawford Blog on August 15, 2008 (boomark / email).