Politicians Worldwide Asking Questions About ACTA 101
An anonymous reader writes "Legislators around the world are demanding more information on the secret Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. US Senator Ron Wyden demanded answers in a letter to the USTR (PDF) this week, ACTA arose in the UK House of Commons yesterday,
and French Deputy Nicolas Dupont-Aignan raised ACTA questions in the National Assembly late last year. All of this comes on top of earlier efforts from Swedish Member of the European Parliament Jens Holm, as well as New Zealand MP Clare Curran, who has repeatedly raised concerns about ACTA, and NDP MP Charlie Angus, who posed questions about ACTA in the Canadian House of Commons late last year."
Not just Wyden - call your Senators (Score:5, Informative)
Thankfully, it's not just Ron Wyden (OR), either. Yesterday, I was present at a meeting between two of Al Franken's (MN) staffers and a number of DC-area IP experts. A Wyden staffer was also in attendance. This means that in the current session, at least Bernie Sanders (VT), Sherrod Brown (OH), Wyden, and Franken have expressed concern about ACTA. Franken's staffers seemed particularly bothered by the fact that since ACTA is being negotiated as an executive agreement, they neither see negotiating texts (which are being done in secret) nor have any chance to review the agreement before it has the force of law. The U.S. Trade Representative's office keeps telling them that such secrecy is par for the course, and one of the questions they were asking us was whether this is true (it's not).
I've also heard mention that Ben Cardin (MD) may have some concerns, though apparently he is more 'conservative' on IP issues than the above senators. In any case, I would urge Slashdotters to learn about ACTA, call their senators (especially if you're in one of the above states, and if you're not, tell your senator that these other senators are looking into it, and they should too), and ask them to grill the Obama administration on it's complete and total lack of transparency on this issue. Ask them why the few public-interest groups who have been permitted to see negotiating texts have been forced to sign non-disclosure agreements, why not a single academic or law professor has had an opportunity to see any of the drafts, and why Ron Kirk has said he believes the agreement will fall apart if it becomes public - while at the same time claiming that it does not go beyond the bounds of current U.S. law.
Re:Not just Wyden - call your Senators (Score:1, Informative)
Troll. Congress is involved in health care where they are excluded from ACTA.
Re:Not just Wyden - call your Senators (Score:3, Informative)
Troll. Congress is involved in health care where they are excluded from ACTA.
Absolutely...and everyone should encourage their representatives to start asking why: https://secure.eff.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=420 [eff.org]
French Deputy Nicolas Dupont-Aignan (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Multilateral treaties are hard to pass (Score:3, Informative)
"(BTW, slightly off topic, I saw a Blu-Ray movie with the FBI copyright warning in French, which I had never seen before on any DVD. That was a little creepy and funny at the same time.)"
The publisher probably just didn't want to produce different runs of discs for the US and Canada. All movies in Canada have the warning in both french and english. It's frequently an INTERPOL warning, but it's particularly entertaining when it's actually an FBI warning.
Re:Checks and Balances . . . ? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Checks and Balances . . . ? (Score:5, Informative)
OP here. The replies already posted get it mostly right. An executive agreement is supposed to comply with existing U.S. law, and for that reason does not have to be reviewed by Congress.
The Obama administration is insisting that ACTA "colors within the lines" of current U.S. law - but of course, there is no way to know that until after it is signed and becomes public. In the meantime, the few public interest folks who have signed NDAs and seen draft texts have said that in their opinion, it goes beyond current U.S. law.
Of course if the agreement simply abides by current U.S. law, why the need to be so secretive about it?
There are a number of other issues - like the fact, IIRC, so-called "graduated response" (three-strikes) style laws are permitted under U.S. law, but not implemented by the DMCA, etc. So, it may be that ACTA contains provisions for three-strikes ISP disconnection despite this not being current law in the U.S. There is also the fact that ACTA will almost certainly not include U.S.-style protections for users/consumers.
Finally, and this is why Congress should be concerned, even if ACTA is totally within the bounds of current U.S. law, once this agreement is settled, if Congress then wants to change the law, the administration will point to this agreement and say "but we can't change our policy because we would be breaking ACTA." This is exactly what has happened with the Berne Convention, TRIPS, and any number of other international agreements. They constrain our future policy options.
Some people would like to see formalities for copyright registration brought back, but as long as we are a Berne signatory, that is not possible. Likewise, say that Congress eventually wants to ban three-strikes style laws (we can dream, right?). If ACTA explicitly requires that such laws are permissible, Congress would not be able to do so.
Re:Checks and Balances . . . ? (Score:4, Informative)
What is known about them in a constitutional respect is that the agreements supersede conflicting state laws (though with ACTA potentially violating state privacy laws that might not be as cut-and-dry as it seems), and that they have been upheld by the Supreme Court. What is not known is what happens when in conflict with a federal law, and it is my general understanding that they can be repealed by Congressional action. They also cannot violate the bill of rights, and presumably any other any other part of the constitution. There was a proposed amendment in 1954 called the Bricker Amendment that would have limited the ability of the executive to make these agreements, but it failed by a single senate vote.
The major arguments against this type of action is that it does bypass the checks and balances, but so long as it is used in a discretionary manner it is a wonderful tool of foreign policy. If you recall, the League of Nations was rejected by America because Congress couldn't act fast enough and then the isolationists started to make noise. A small check was enacted to try and keep these agreements from being totally secret called the Case Act in 1972, which requires all international agreements be reported from the Secretary of State to Congress, but it has a flaw in language that exempts anything called an accord or arrangement instead of an agreement.
So yes, in theory the executive could keep ACTA a total secret from everybody if he called it an arrangement, even while it's policies were being enacted. But that's never going to happen because Congress would just denote in the budget that no money can go to the enforcement of ACTA protocols, and it would be dead. More likely, the text is revealed after the agreement is signed and then the fight is for Congress to repeal it - a much more difficult process than fighting to keep it from being ratified - and it would have the force of law until then.
Re:It's good to have the spotlight shone on apathy (Score:5, Informative)
And which public would that be? The one's that take their civic responsibility seriously, or the public that yells at their politician through the TV? Your complaints about "fraudulent governance" or "public mandate" would actually mean something if people were actually participating and the entire failure was they were simply being overpowered. But it's rather hard to be sympathetic over someone who simply lies there and takes it. Get back with me on "fraudulent governance" and "public mandate" once the global public grows a backbone and actually starts understanding that mandates don't come from silence, but faulty governance does.
Canada recently had an open consultations about the direction of copyright in the future for Canada, where the public was invited to town hall meetings and to participate in web forums, and to contact their MPs.
The response was huge, and the overwhelming majority wanted copyright to be limited, no anti-circumvention laws, no penalties for non-commercial infringement, abolition of crown copyright, a promise that copyright duration would never be extended beyond life+50, and for fair dealing (what we call fair use) to be expanded greatly.
The Canadian pubic participated, and made their voices heard.
The whole time, ACTA was being negotiated in Seoul, and another trade agreement equally as ridiculous was being negotiated in Europe (http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/4627/125/)
The entire public consultation was a sham. The whole thing was just a big distraction so the government can do whatever the hell it wants, directly go against the will of the people, and still say "you had your chance to speak up, you spoke we listened"
We might as well stay home and yell at the TV.
Going out and talking to our elected representatives is equally ineffective, so why waste the gas to go out?
Re:The Senate is Taking Refuge in Audacity (Score:5, Informative)
World fascism is about three years away, and there's nothing we can do but watch
Speak for yourself. Here in the US we still have our firearms ;)