Kyle Brady: Blog » Barack Obama

Destroying America With Corporate Funds [OpEd]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:05:20 +0000

Last week, the United States Supreme Court made a decision, on a 5-4 vote, that corporations are entities with corporate personhood, and, as such, are allowed the rights of Free Speech. This essentially reverses decades, if not a century, of precedence that understood fictional creations do not have even a close resemblance to people, and do not deserve the same freedoms, rights, and considerations. However, the ideological, and tangentially financial, interests of a bitterly divided Court are apparently more important than the structure and sanity of the nation or its people. Corporations are now permitted to essentially spend their funds, in a political context, as they see fit – inevitably leading to even greater corruption than already exists within the American government.

It should come as no surprise that the current Court, a body of nine individuals, holds six members that were appointed by a Republican President, and all but one of them voted in favor of this decision. Republicans have, in the last three decades, lauded the ideals of Big Business, the free market, and deregulation, and this ruling is nothing less than a major victory for their party’s ideology and financial backers. As evidenced by the last year of political nonsense, the process of passing legislation within America is nothing less than selling out to the highest bidder, and, since Republicans consider Big Business to be their greatest supporter, they have sold out at an even greater cost than ever before: the ultimate vitality and stability of the nation.

Much has been said about how this is going to destroy American politics, especially by President Obama and the ever-bold Representative Alan Grayson, as nearly every thinking citizen realizes that allowing oil companies, Wall Street, the insurance cartel, and other corporate interests with large bank accounts the ability to influence politicians, or those voting politicians into office, will lead to nothing but utter disaster – there was a reason why corporate interests were divested from the political process in the first place. Even those Republicans/conservatives without a political career understand what a terrible moment for Democracy this decision is. Healthcare legislation has been difficult enough to pass without the direct intervention of the very industry that wants so desperately for it fail, but what will happen when they are allowed an even greater influence?

It is sad, disappointing, and, above all, embarrassing that the Republicans of the Supreme Court would place party interests over intelligent decisions on cases, essentially eschewing the very job they are paid to do. Even more worrisome, however, is that these Justices are of the very same party that shouted in self-righteous anger, during the Justice Sotomayor confirmation process, about using the Court to make policy and allowing personal politics to become embroiled in the judicial process – a deeply ironic moment for the Republican party. One of the prevailing rules of the American judicial system is that precedent counts heavily in case decisions, with the weight increasing relative to its age and strength, but this no longer seems to matter. The case that resulted in the outrageous decision to allow corporate personhood was not one that was brought to the Supreme Court for this purpose, but rather was reformed for this purpose to allow a bully pulpit for the conservative Justices to shape American politics through their substantial influence that is entirely independent of an election process or term limits. If ever there was an example of using the Court to make policy, placing personal politics before the judicial process, and abusing power, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission is it.

If Congress has become so corrupt and politically divided as to become almost impotent, and the Supreme Court is willing to overturn laws, regulation, and precedent at ideological whims, who is left to defend the people of the United States of America? In a three-tiered government meant to produce the best possible outcome, not the worst, only the President is left to stand up for what is right, ethical, and noble. But while the Office of the President has gained power since the foundation of the nation, President Obama can only produce so much either by himself or through sheer political strength of will. He has many grand ideas based on what has historically produced the best results, such as industry regulation, and the successful policy decisions of other nations, such as a progressive overhaul of healthcare; however, none of this can be accomplished on his own, or by any lone President, because of the very structure of America’s government.

This dire political state will only further collapse if corporate interests and personal greed are continued to allow free reign within the political system of the United States. For a great nation that has accomplished so much and influenced the world in such a large and beneficial fashion, the devolution into a non-functioning Democratic Republic that does not represent its people has apparently arrived to the great sadness of thinking persons worldwide.

Do Not Allow A Distraction From Net Neutrality [OpEd]

Kyle Brady — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 07:05:23 +0000

It was inevitable, and rather predictable, that the FCC would announce interest in Net Neutrality regulation, with Congress scheduled to be close behind, since copyright law is being used as an offensive weapon towards ISPs and their customers, ISPs feel they can throttle user’s connections at will, many network managers have strange ideas about their equipment, and the same ISPs tend to disconnect users they consider troublesome as a matter of normal practice. All of these issues, and a few more, make up the core of Net Neutrality, which remains a fundamental digital freedoms and rights issue that must be addressed in the near-term for continued modern growth.

However, all of this has been said before.

What has not been said before is that while the upcoming fight was known to be difficult, thanks to the obvious self-interest of the ISPs and deep-pocketed interest groups like the RIAA, it will now be considerably harder – the political willpower that should be interested in the rights of the American people is demonstrably weaker than the nation previously believed. The “healthcare debate” may be almost over, but the last six months has proven that this specific American flavor of democracy is highly partisan, filled with misleading propaganda, easily influenced, and often irrational or childish. The issue of Net Neutrality will be no different.

In fact, Republican Senators have already moved to protect their campaign financiers before any official action or legislation has even been proposed. It should come as no surprise that elected officials hell-bent on preventing regulation of any sort and downsizing government, while contributing to Big Government themselves, would take such action. What is surprising is that members of the minority party would take a stand on what amounts to merely a speech by another official, even as their current partisan behavior lands them in further trouble with the nation-at-large.

Assuming for a moment that these Senators actually understand the issues surrounding Net Neutrality, and were not simply reacting to the idea of increased regulation by a Federal agency, it presents a worrisome reality: no matter the issue, its public support, or the need for legislation, the Republican Party is going to automatically object to any and all actions by President Obama, his Administration, and any Democratic politician. On the issue of Net Neutrality, it is very clear that regulation is not only necessary and practical, but would serve as a formal recognition of the fundamental digital rights that American citizens hold – the only parties that contest such a regulatory need are those would actually be regulated. And yet, just as in the issue of healthcare reform, it is being fought against for vague and highly suspect reasons that do not echo the beliefs of the People.

The FCC, along with President Obama and the intelligent portions of Congress, must not allow the issue of Net Neutrality to degrade in the manner in which healthcare reform did – this would result in unnecessary compromises and extended debate, both of which are entirely unacceptable in this issue of digital rights and freedoms for American citizens. Besides undermining the Obama Administration by sandbagging the issues with all their might, while destroying their own party from the inside, Republicans absolutely cannot be allowed to hijack American politics for their own selfish and childish goals.

The needs of the American People must come before those of self-serving, partisan Congressmen who cannot fully comprehend most of the issues on which they legislate, and Net Neutrality is too important to fall prey to such political machinations. Digital rights and freedoms must be officially recognized by the Federal Government in order to move intelligently forward as a connected nation – to ignore, write off, or otherwise sidestep addressing this issue would be nothing short of Unconstitutional.

A phrase with which the Republican Party should now be intimately familiar.

Congrats to Obama [Self]

Kyle Brady — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 04:25:35 +0000

As of right now, CNN has declared Obama to be our next President.

Just in case they're wrong. Like last time.

Congrats to Barack Obama, since I think it was very important that he win. Not only is he our first black President, but he also has the potential to completely reverse alot of our "image problems" that have been created recently.

I'm proud to be a Republican For Obama, who (obviously?) voted for Obama.

p.s. I have it on good authority that Mr. Obama himself reads my blog... so: Thanks, Mr. President!

p.s.s. 4chan's beloved /b/ is going nuts over all of this.

America’s CTO [Old Content]

Kyle Brady — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:04:11 +0000

As Obama reaches the inevitable (our next President), people are talking more and more about his specific ideas and how his "computer savvy" and "youngness" are really going to (probably) see alot of changes in policy. Most recently, people have been talking about his promise to create a position that amounts to "CTO of America", someone who would watch and govern over the interests of American technology and Net Neutrality, as well as help bring the antiquated government policies into the real and modern world.

Scoble recently promoted his list of potential candidates, and why he ultimately thinks Lawrence "Founder of Creative Commons" Lessig would be a perfect fit. Duncan Riley took a different position, and is behind Dave "Father of RSS" Winer. Personally? I have two opinions on this.

I'm glad Scoble's name has never come up in these conversations. Believe it or not, he actually didn't even nominate himself - completely out of character. We need to avoid the PR echo chamber "Internet celebrities", because not only are they not savvy enough to lead government policy on bleeding-edge technology, but they would probably make the position a joke by acting as if it were a blog. Who really wants to see the CTO promoting Twitter or some idiotic Facebook app? Not me. So that means we need to avoid:

Robert "Smiling Ego" Scoble

Michael "PR Aggregator" Arrington

Jason "Annoying Failtrepreneur" Calacanis

Kevin "Why Is He Famous?" Rose

Meg "Destroyed Ebay" Whitman

etc.

We need someone young enough to be "hip" with the times, bleeding edge enough to be relevant, but also someone old (and intelligent) enough to ignore the majority of the current stream of trash across the Internet. Here's some of my choices:

Brad "EFF Troublemaker" Templeton --- [his blog]

Lawrence "Destroy Traditional Copyright" Lessig --- [his site]

Peter "Visionary Extraordinaire" Norvig --- [his site]

Chris "Open Source Advocate" Messina --- [his blog]

William "Internet Visionary, Father of Cyberpunk" Gibson --- [his blog]

Tim "Bleeding Edge Advocate" O'Reilly --- [his site]

Tim "Father of the Internet" Berners-Lee --- [his blog]

I know, that's a pretty long and across-the-board list, but I think they're actually viable candidates. I obviously left out people like Linus "Gatekeeper of Linux" Torvalds because they are so anti-politics and have such an inflammatory personality that they aren't even options.

--- --- ---

Update (8/23/2008 5:10pm PST): I got a response via email from Peter Norvig. His thoughts? "Thanks. I'd probably go for Bruce Schneier, Jim Fruchterman, Eric Brewer, Dave Patterson." I'd have to say I agree with him on Schneier and Patterson, actually.

Update (8/23/2008 5:25pm PST): Lawrence Lessig just responded via email as well, disputing my label as "Destroy Copyright". In all honesty, I mean that as "traditional copyright", so I've modified it to reflect the real meaning. Sorry Lawrence!

Update (8/23/2008 9:15pm PST): Tim O'Reilly emailed back, with suggestions of Brian Behlendorf and Ray Ozzie. Good suggestions.