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White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

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Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#241

Post by Zak »

coffeemug wrote: post #165

When I train our employees to respond to customer support issues, I always make sure that in every response they do as much as possible to "drive an issue to a close". Not every issue can be fixed, but at the very least we can give the user a clear understanding of a) precisely what the state of affairs is and why, b) whether or not we can fix it and why, c) if we can fix it, who's responsible for the fix and when it…

The political process doesn't work like a business. If you're the CEO and something Bob knows how to do needs doing, you just order him to do it.

None of the entities with the legal authority to fix this problem work directly for the president. He cannot fire them because he doesn't like how they're doing their jobs, nor can they fire him for that reason.

There is one, and only one person with the unilateral legal authority to fix the unlocking ban. His name is James Hadley Billington.

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#242

Post by teeja »

sinak wrote: post #2

Hey guys, petition starter here. Just wanted to thank anyone who signed for their support. I just got off the phone with the White House and they're really enthusiastic about getting this fixed. We also discussed fixing Section 1201 of the DMCA permanently, and they've agreed to continue the conversation on that. When I originally posted this to HN at http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5112020 there were a lot of ve…

Congratulations for demonstrating once again that it's worth trying to do something about it. It's the only alternative to taking it in the neck over and over whilst crying in bitter beer.

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#243

Post by nl »

jimmaswell wrote: post #220
brownbat wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Power is still in the hands of those who have bought it. As former Presidents Steve Forbes, Nelson Rockefeller, Ross Perot, Donald Trump, John (Heinz) Kerry, and Mitt Romney clearly demonstrate, money is all that matters in politics.

Former president Mitt Romney?

Exactly.

(ie, Money is important, but it isn't the only thing)

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#244

Post by AnthonyMouse »

zanny wrote: post #221
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Republicans and democrats collude together, and are both paid off by almost every major company in the US to vote in their favor. Not exactly. There are two things that win elections: Money and votes. And money only because it can be used to buy votes. When the major parties agree on an issue it's because that issue has a stable equilibrium: Either the parties both side with the electorate or the monied interests be…

We had the ability to pressure with votes 50 years ago. Today, the vast majority of congressional districts are so heavily gerrymandered the ruling party can do anything and the political climate of that region is so fanatic that people will never not vote for their choice party candidate. Out of 435 house representatives, each election every two years, only a dozen or two seats will change party. At best. That often…

Gerrymandering is a serious problem, but it just changes the tactics necessary to win: Instead of spreading out nationwide to try to change the result in every individual district, we concentrate on the districts with contested seats. And because those seats determine who gets the majority in the legislature, if you can cause a substantial number of votes to change sides in those districts based on the party's stance on your issue, you can influence the party's platform -- or deprive them of the 51st vote necessary to pass legislation contrary to our interests, because the representative from the contested district can't vote against us without it costing the next election.

In addition to that, gerrymandering just pushes the real campaign into the primaries for those seats. If your representative's party has a hard lock on your district's seat, do what the Tea Party has been doing and primary the incumbent. And fewer people vote in the primaries, so each vote you can shift from one candidate to another counts for more there.

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#245

Post by nl »

jussij wrote: post #195
brownbat wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Power is still in the hands of those who have bought it. As former Presidents Steve Forbes, Nelson Rockefeller, Ross Perot, Donald Trump, John (Heinz) Kerry, and Mitt Romney clearly demonstrate, money is all that matters in politics.

You have to look know futher than to the likes of Jack Abramoff to know US government is controlled by money: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Abramoff Just one example from the link: > Abramoff and his law firm were paid at least $6.7 million by the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) from 1995 to 2001, which made manufacture goods with the "Made in the USA" label but is not subject to U.S. labor an…

What’s good about that one is it went on for years and all the politicians knew about it.

I think you are trying to make the point that money bought the all politicians. While that is somewhat true in some cases it isn't the full story.

I suspect if you dig deeper what you will find is that no one cared enough to fix the problem.

I'd note in particular that the bill designed to stop the abuses in CNMI was passed unanimously in the Senate, but then blocked by Tom DeLay in the house[1]. While is it easy to say that DeLay blocked the bill because of money, the truth is that DeLay is quite happy to block any bill that involves new labor laws.

Abramoff found someone who's politics already aligned with what he wanted to happen and then made sure that person saw it as something important enough to do something about it.

I'm not at all sure that is political corruption at all.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Abramoff_CNMI_scandal

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#246

Post by AnthonyMouse »

homosaur wrote: post #238
zanny wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had the ability to pressure with votes 50 years ago. Today, the vast majority of congressional districts are so heavily gerrymandered the ruling party can do anything and the political climate of that region is so fanatic that people will never not vote for their choice party candidate. Out of 435 house representatives, each election every two years, only a dozen or two seats will change party. At best. That often…

You're absolutely right about this and this is why third parties have to be a huge part of any reform effort. The system has been gerrymandered to support two parties, but not three. If someone can attack the entrenched party from either the left or right and gain passion about specific, focused issues the whole corrupt system falls apart, hopefully long enough to pass a widespread reform effort.

Forget about third parties. Third parties can't win with a first past the post voting system -- the minute you have three viable parties, the two most similar parties immediately starting losing elections to the least similar party because the more similar parties split the vote between one another, and since they're not stupid they realize this and stop running candidates against one another, effectively merging into a single party.

But you can get the result you want through the primaries. Run your candidate against the incumbent in the primary and keep emphasizing your specific issues and publicizing the incumbent's corrupt stance on them -- even if you don't always win, you may be able to get the incumbent to change positions.

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#247

Post by Wonderdonkey »

Read: Nothing will come of this. President Obama also said he would veto CISPA, close Guantanamo Bay, curb ICE, pull troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, end indefinite detention, defend labor rights, stop hiring former lobbyists in the White House, end the practice of recess appointments, oppose FISA, and end the use of drones to assassinate terrorists, among many other blatant lies.

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#248

Post by AnthonyMouse »

dyno12345 wrote: post #230
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether it actually gets enforced doesn't matter, what matters whether people refrain from engaging in the activity (or aiding others in doing so) because of the risk that it could be.

There's always that risk with unenforced laws - there's hardly ever (ever?) a stated policy of non-enforcement, since the executive is also technically obliged to enforce everything congress has told it to. I would generally be interested to know if it ever has actually been enforced so far.

https://www.eff.org/wp/unintended-consequences-under-dmca

Re: White House Response to “Make Unlocking Cell Phones Legal”

#250

Post by fakeer »

Aah... Wish my country(India - the largest family owned 'democracy' on this planet) had something like this. Here we get arrested for posting things on Internet. Maybe starting such a petition would attract life imprisonment.

Congratulation Americans! Glad for you. Don't loose this freedom, don't let them take this away from you and wish us luck and support so that we can get/snatch it too. One day, maybe :-)

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