None. Zero. Zilch.

What will fix immigration problems in the United States, specifically the sort they’re after in Arizona? I believe they want to stop “illegals” from coming to their state. If that’s the case, then fine. A state is free to pass any law that their people want, as long as it doesn’t conflict in any way with the United States Constitution or Federal law. Maybe SB 1070 meets those thresholds – or maybe it doesn’t. Time and the courts will decide that. What will fix the problem the Arizona government perceives, permanently?

Criminalize – and by criminalize, I don’t just mean ‘fine’ – I mean, criminalize, as in with a felony-level penalty, the hiring of a single “illegal”, “undocumented worker”, or anyone who can’t demonstrate conclusively that they are indeed legally authorized to work in the state of Arizona. How criminal should it be? If I’m a business owner, be it a farmer, a manufacturer, or a homeowner that needs yard work done, and I hire an “illegal”… I go to jail.

Arrest me. Fine me. Prosecute me.

If guilty, I now have a felony conviction. Yes, a FELONY. The criminal convictions you have to report for the rest of your natural life; the criminal convictions that may cost you the right to vote; the criminal convictions that can cost you your own job or career. Prosecute me ruthlessly if I’ve hired an “illegal”. No sane person in those conditions would even think about hiring someone they shouldn’t. There will be, literally, no market for these workers in Arizona then, and they will go elsewhere. Problem solved for Arizona.

But that would require making Americans responsible for what they’ve done themselves: brought these illegal immigrants to Arizona. If American employers weren’t hiring the immigrants and creating their shadow economy, why would they even come here? Yes, the immigrants are at fault. They snuck into the United States: they didn’t come in legally. The American EMPLOYERS are 100% equally at fault, however. SB 1070 does nothing to fix this. Unless Arizona makes employers face criminal penalties – and enforces the same – to stop the immigrants from coming, why would they stop? It’s a nonsensical idea.

But this idea will never happen, because it wouldn’t just tip over the socioeconomic and political apple cart in Arizona: it would set the cart on fire and make it explode.

For all those people who say that gay and lesbian couples don’t need to be able to ‘marry’ to have the same legal protections and rights as us hetero couples, consider the abominable horror that has happened in Sonoma County, California. These men had their legal rights and wishes ignored based on what the lawsuit charges. If only they’d been able to marry, like all people are in civilized nations. Proposition 8 and sociopathic hate still haunt California and destroy lives.

Clay and his partner of 20 years, Harold, lived in California. Clay and Harold made diligent efforts to protect their legal rights, and had their legal paperwork in place—wills, powers of attorney, and medical directives, all naming each other. Harold was 88 years old and in frail medical condition, but still living at home with Clay, 77, who was in good health.

One evening, Harold fell down the front steps of their home and was taken to the hospital. Based on their medical directives alone, Clay should have been consulted in Harold’s care from the first moment. Tragically, county and health care workers instead refused to allow Clay to see Harold in the hospital. The county then ultimately went one step further by isolating the couple from each other, placing the men in separate nursing homes. Ignoring Clay’s significant role in Harold’s life, the county continued to treat Harold like he had no family and went to court seeking the power to make financial decisions on his behalf. Outrageously, the county represented to the judge that Clay was merely Harold’s “roommate.” The court denied their efforts, but did grant the county limited access to one of Harold’s bank accounts to pay for his care.

What happened next is even more chilling: without authority, without determining the value of Clay and Harold’s possessions accumulated over the course of their 20 years together or making any effort to determine which items belonged to whom, the county took everything Harold and Clay owned and auctioned off all of their belongings. Adding further insult to grave injury, the county removed Clay from his home and confined him to a nursing home against his will. The county workers then terminated Clay and Harold’s lease and surrendered the home they had shared for many years to the landlord.

Three months after he was hospitalized, Harold died in the nursing home. Because of the county’s actions, Clay missed the final months he should have had with his partner of 20 years. Compounding this tragedy, Clay has literally nothing left of the home he had shared with Harold or the life he was living up until the day that Harold fell, because he has been unable to recover any of his property.

The California news media isn’t really covering this yet. It’s basically limited to Facebook–click here for the Facebook group–various different blogs, one op-ed on Salon, and some YouTube activity.

We can only hope it’s a matter of time until the news media picks it up and runs with it. Even their local newspaper–which, coincidentally, is owned by the New York Times–isn’t covering it either yet for some reason.

Update, April 19 2010. Via Dan Savage here, the PDF legal complaint.

On or about June 28 and continuing through August 2008, Defendants ACV, DILLINGHAM, COUNTY, LIEDHOLM, STAGG-HOURIGAN, BREWSTER, and others and each of them, did not allow Plaintiff GREENE access to [Harold Scull], his partner of 25 years, who was terminally ill. On or about June 28 and continuing through August 2008, Defendants ACV, DILLINGHAM, COUNTY, LIEDHOLM, STAGG-HOURIGAN, BREWSTER, and others and each of them, falsely imprisoned Plaintiff GREENE, keeping him behind a locked gate at Defendant ACV’s premises and restricting and limiting his movements and communications with his friends, family, and the general public…. Plaintiff was put in fear of physical harm, was and felt intimidated and attacked, and remains fearful that he will be chased down and locked up again.

On or about August, 2008, Defendants MICHAEL BREWSTER and KAREN STAGG-HOURIGAN, as employees of the COUNTY acting in their official capacities… did disparage and demean Plaintiff GREENE in his presence and in the presence of others, making and/or ratifying derogatory references to Plaintiff GREENE’s sexual orientation and age, stating “you know how those ‘gay boys’ are”…

After [Harold Scull's] death, Defendants BREWSTER and STAGG-HOURIGAN further expressed displeasure at dealing with expressions of grief by a gay man who had lost his long-time partner.

Accountant to director to COO to CEO to chairman to shareholder with the most stock by percentage, and if that shareholder is a holding firm or another company, you repeat the chain of responsibility there at the executive level, until you finally hit someone. Any ‘crime’ must have someone ultimately legally responsible, who will face jail time. A corporation has to be accountable to the people, and that’s the only way. Some of these companies literally exhale money in the way that we exhale carbon dioxide. A $50,000,000 fine for them is an accounting aberration, not a deterrent against future evil or even criminal activities. Until you have multiple individuals led from the court rooms in shackles, it won’t stop, because it has no reason to.

I wonder how Constitutional a law would be that mandated that any groups that interact with or oversee children, from pre/nursery schools to high schools to Churches to Scouts were legally required to report to police any and all suspected acts of child rape, and that failure to do so would itself be a criminal penalty? Combine that with complete elimination of all statutes of limitations on child rape crimes–and no statutes of limitations on the failure to report bit–and I wonder if it would all be legally upheld.

The Church would oppose it as they’re opposing this pending bill in Connecticut:

A bill in Connecticut’s legislature that would remove the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse cases has sparked a fervent response from the state’s Roman Catholic bishops, who released a letter to parishioners Saturday imploring them to oppose the measure.

However, I can’t imagine this not having massive popular support in general. The Church seems to be incapable of or unwilling to clean up their own mess here, even though they’re in no position of authority like they were in, let’s say, 1600. But they continue to act as if they were, or as if humility in the face of their rape victims were somehow beneath them. Here’s another one from the Associated Press, from today. I’m going to highlight in boldface the passages that are problems.

Initially, the Vatican responded defensively, with Vatican officials and cardinals accusing the media, the Masons, pro-abortion rights and pro-gay marriage supporters for plotting attacks against the pope. Recently, the Vatican has shifted course, still complaining about an anti-Catholic campaign but also promising more transparency and taking initiatives to at least give an impression that change is afoot.

Lombardi said new initiatives were being studied, including more papal meetings with victims as well as a “deepening of the measures of prevention and response” to abuse. He declined to elaborate. But victims groups have long complained that the Vatican has never issued any universal norms instructing bishops on the pastoral care they should provide for victims or prevention strategies to make sure pedophiles aren’t admitted into the priesthood in the first place.

What’s the problem there? Where is the mention or even implication that if a priest rapes a minor of a police notification? If a school principal, nurse, or teacher suspected such a thing, they’re even legally required to notify police. Is the fact we don’t require this of clergy some sense of respect or deference for the Church? We even now have private groups like the Boy Scouts of America doing the same thing: not taking full notification of responsibility. They just lost that trial in Oregon, by the way, for covering up child rape. But who–which person or persons–in the Boy Scouts leadership was ultimately responsible for this? Who made the decision to shield rapists? Who is responsible in the United States for shielding rapists in the Church?

Treat this as it is, legally and logically: aiding and abetting a criminal rapist of children. We should treat this as a felony criminal action. Take this, from Wikipedia (I looked it up, and it’s legitimate):

As indicated by the Supreme Court of the United States, “In order to aid and abet another to commit a crime it is necessary that a defendant ‘in some sort associate himself with the venture, that he participate in it as in something that he wishes to bring about, that he seek by his action to make it succeed.” Nye & Nissen v. United States, 336 U.S. 613, 618 (1949) quoting Judge Learned Hand in U.S. v. Peoni 100 F.2d 401, 402 (2d. Cir. 1938).

The key passage for me is this: “that he seek by his action to make it succeed.” What else is there, in concealing, shielding, and defending in an undercover-from-the-law manner a pedophile but then to allow the criminal further success in the rape of children?

###

What do we do, then, about this?

I’m actually seriously considering mailing my state Senate and Legislative reps with such a suggestion. They’re wonderful people and responsive, so I know the suggestion would get at least a review. Anyone think such a set of laws could pass constitutional muster?

###

Example “Defense of Children” Law

Key points:

a. Eliminate statutes of limitations on child sexual abuse.

b. Mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse will extended to any group (including religious) with direct access to minors. Reporting will now be to police who will pass it on to child services as well. Based upon and an expansion to these codes:

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/Rcw/default.aspx?cite=26.44.030
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/Rcw/default.aspx?cite=26.44.040

c. Failure to report child sexual abuse in a timely manner will be criminalized.

d. Groups (including religious) must screen those with access and in public report negative findings to parents or guardians or face cumulative fines until they do so.

e. Any groups failing to notify police of suspected child sexual abuse will face cumulative fines for each day they do not report (not retroactive back beyond this becoming law).

f. Three-strikes law for those convicted of child sexual abuse with significant teeth to protect children.

Detailed aspects of the hypothetical law:

1. Elimination of all statutes of limitations related to child sexual abuse or child pornography on all Washington state laws immediately and retroactively.

2. Legally require any groups, agencies, or bodies that oversee, supervise, or educate minors to register with the state, and all people involved who have any potential access to children. All such individuals must be screened by police for any possible crimes, sexual or otherwise, related to children or minors. Any such individuals with such crimes in their history must be notified to all parents and guardians at the school, group, or institution should the individual be hired no later than seven business days after the hiring occurs. Failure to do so will result in a $150,000 fine per day until such notification occurs. The penalty will be applied to the institution, school, or organization, not to individuals. Such notification must be in writing. All current people covered on this must have the required background checks completed within 6 calendar months of this becoming law. All new hires or new personnel must be vetted as they gain access to children.

3. Any and all staff or volunteers at any registered school, group, or organization is legally required to disclose any child sexual abuse or child pornography by adults upon minors which they become aware of. Any of the people responsible who fail to notify local police and the state Department of Health and Child Services of suspected child sexual abuse upon documented reporting of it will be criminally liable for aiding and abetting, and subject to full legal prosecution. There is no statute of limitation on the requirement of reporting, e.g., a ten-year-old crime must still be reported if uncovered, from the time the law is enacted. The criminal penalty for “aiding and abetting” will correspond to the appropriate such crime as defined elsewhere in Washington State law. Known crimes against children must be reported to local police within seven calendar days of their discovery, for a crime occurring after this becomes law. Historical crimes must be reported within seven days of this bill becoming law to local police. Local police are required to report these crimes in turn to child protective services.

4. Should the institution itself upon being notified of such an abuse, by the victim, the victim’s family, or other sources not notify authorities within three calendar days, they would result in a $250,000 fine per day until such notification occurs. The penalty will be applied to the institution, school, or organization, not to individuals. Such penalties are not retroactive further back then the date this becomes Washington State law.

5. Three strikes: upon being convicted of three incidences of child sexual abuse or child pornography, the subject will be immediately subject to a minimum incarceration of 50 years.

NOTES: As far as I am aware, the exemption on section #4 for crimes committed before the implementation should prevent a 10-year old unreported crime from suddenly leveling a hypothetical $912,500,000 penalty on a Church, school district, or Boy Scout troop. However, the wording if applied would put them at risk of penalty from any new crimes or prior crimes going forward. Individuals–should the crimes and potential cover-up be revealed–would still be liable under criminal penalties in section #3. In essence, the massive $250,000 per day criminal fine would apply only to new crimes in purpose, but the criminal penalties to individuals for covering up prior crimes would remain. This one ‘grandfather’ exemption combination would penalize appropriately anyone who didn’t come forward with evidence of an old crime. The daily cumulative institutional penalty is for new crimes going forward. The goal isn’t to destroy organizations: it’s to stop child abuse and protect children. However, if institutions are harmed by the passage of this law, the lesson and example will be set that children are more important to protect than any other group. If a group is unwilling to put children first above their own membership and other interests, the penalties accrued would be deserved.

FAILURE AS A CRIME/AIDING & ABETTING CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE: There are many precedents of criminalizing in United States law a “failure to…” scenario. Failure to pay child support. Most states have some penalties for certain parties (Washington included) for failing to report child abuse. There are numerous other precedents where criminal omission is legally sound and could be prosecuted as a crime. The law could take either approach safely for it’s end result of enforcing criminal penalties for failure to report a felony crime against children such as sexual abuse. Would anyone refuse to report a pedophile for abusing children, once it was documented that they were aware of the crime, if it meant a likely felony conviction for themselves as well?

EXAMPLE CASE: The laws are enacted January 1, 2011. On July 1, 2011 a teacher abuses a student. A co-worker learns of it it on July 4, 2011. By July 11, 2011, the co-worker must make a notification of the crime to police, or he becomes complicit and subject to criminal penalty and arrest.

RATIONALE: The only way to ‘break’ permanently historical institutionalized abuses of children and cover-ups is to make everyone legally and fiscally responsible and liable. Target just the individual, and the group has no disincentive to throw the individual ‘under a bus’. Target just the group, and the people responsible may be free to continue as they have previously. Target both with a heavy financial and legal hammer, and positive changes will respond in kind. I am modeling this very loosely in spirit on how Sarbanes-Oxley financial compliance requirements were formed in response to the Enron situation. Unless a law has teeth to punish those responsible on all levels, nothing will change to protect our children. Will this destroy and bankrupt a church, a diocese, or a local Boy Scout organization, using them as hypothetical examples? Absolutely not, provided they are always willing to place the needs of children above their own self-interests at any and all times, and to put state law above canon law in how to handle pedophilia, in the case of the church.

     (Obviously, such wording would need to be written to fully comply with the style, formatting, and tenor of other laws in Washington state’s codes, but I was aiming to get across the point and heart of what would be desired here, not to draft a formalized bill.)

###

Yes, I’m actually saying let’s criminally charge anyone who fails to notify authorities of child rape, if they are an employee or member of a given organization. Yes, the fine on #4 is significantly higher than the fine on #2. If these people won’t clean up their messes and stop the rape of our children, we’ll make them do so or they can live without their social organizations when they end up criminally bankrupt.

I wonder how this would fly. I know that if this–somehow–made it to debate in Olympia that there would be massive opposition from religious groups and likely others as well, but I really can’t imagine a lack of popular support, if this was all Constitutional.

WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad — including two Reuters news staff.

Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded.

The video, Wikileaks says, was taken from a US Apache helicopter on July 2, 2007, in Baghdad, which shows the killing of civilians and Reuters news staff. Reuters has been trying since then to get the video released without luck, but Wikileaks had it leaked to them in an encrypted format, and had it decrypted. Now it’s literally all over the Internet.

Let’s see how long it takes the national US news media to really chase this down. Or, if they do… and how long until the Wikileaks staff are targeted now?

OK, done? Next read this:

I just received an email from Wikileaks editor Julian Assange that’s pretty wild. It accuses the U.S. government of deliberately trying to take down the whistle-blower site PDF two years ago.

As proof, Wikileaks has posted a 32-page classified document PDF from the Department of Defense Intelligence Analysis program, dated March 2008, which details “the counterintelligence threat posed to the US Army by the Wikileaks.org Web site.” It reads:

“The possibility that a current employee or mole within DoD or elsewhere in the US government is providing sensitive information or classified information to Wikileaks.org cannot be ruled out. Wikileaks.org claims that the ‘leakers’ or ‘whistleblowers’ of sensitive or classified DoD documents are former US government employees.”

Now read this article:

The document, attributed to the Army Counterintelligence Center and titled “Wikileaks.org — An Online Reference to Foreign Intelligence Services, Insurgents, or Terrorist Groups?”, cited the leaking of classified Army materials as the chief reason Wikileaks is harmful to national security.

Basically, Wikileaks–I used to read it sometimes, but couldn’t make heads or tails of half the things I was looking at–became a massive clearinghouse of all sorts of leaked, useful information. It got a foreign bank to sue them in the United States for some nonsense of impeding trade, which was finally thrown out in court after the the bank was humiliated. If I recall right, Wikileaks just kept leaking their stuff right out during trial, so they gave up. With this, the government under Bush’s administration actually looked into ways to take them down. Well, tonight it looks like, on top of the above mentioned news, they’ve apparently really pissed off the US intel orginization this time–I’ve never seen commentary like this from them before. From their twitter:

WikiLeaks is currently under an aggressive US and Icelandic surveillance operation. Following/photographing/filming/detaining. about 1 hours ago

If anything happens to us, you know why: it is our Apr 5 film. And you know who is responsible. about 1 hours ago

Two under State Dep diplomatic cover followed our editor from Iceland to http://skup.no on Thursday. about 1 hours ago

One related person was detained for 22 hours. Computer’s seized.That’s http://www.skup.no 44 minutes ago

We know our possession of the decrypted airstrike video is now being discussed at the highest levels of US command. 32 minutes ago

If you know more about the operations against us, contact https://secure.wikileaks.org/ 31 minutes ago

We have been shown secret photos of our production meetings and been asked specific questions during detention related to the airstrike. 27 minutes ago

We have airline records of the State Dep/CIA tails. Don’t think you can get away with it. You cannot. This is WikiLeaks. 23 minutes ago

Even when the heat is on, someone leaks them CIA airline records from the investigation? Yes, someone will call bullshit, but they do I think have a reputation for being bullshit-free. Looks like the Internet has finally caught up with the Old World of governments, and the governments are pissed they can’t control the Internet. Too bad.

More at: http://www.wikileaks.org and http://twitter.com/wikileaks.

Update: apparently, it’s got something to do with this…

Original Dutch news article: Amerikaanse autoriteiten pakken Wikileaks aan
Translated on InfoWars (if you hate Alex Jones, here’s the Google translation): WikiLeaks Monitored by U.S., Icelandic Authorities Over Pentagon Murder Video

It looks like Wikileaks may have evidence of some sort of murder carried out by the US military or possibly the CIA (sorry for the bad translation):

On April 5 to Wikileaks at a meeting of the National Press Club in Washington a video showing an attack by the U.S. Air Force. It would involve a murder carried out by the Pentagon. The staff of the site also draw on information from CIA aircraft have as supporting evidence.

If that’s true, it implies that the airstrike–I have no idea what airstrike this is about–violated either domestic or international law and/or was an outright murder versus a legal military action. If their claims of being detained and followed overseas by United States officials and the CIA are true, then they’ve definitely got their hands on something the State Department, Pentagon or CIA don’t want out there. I wonder what?

Is this about the Kunduz airstrike in Afghanistan from September 4, 2009, when a US F-15 caused the deaths of dozens of civilians? Or is it about, as rumored online, an assassination of journalists by the military that was recorded–which Wikileaks alluded to on February 20th, 2010?

Finally cracked the encryption to US military video in which journalists, among others, are shot. Thanks to all who donated $/CPUs.

More here on Technorati: Is WikiLeaks.org Being Tailed By Government Ops?

April 5, 2010 update:

Wikileaks has disclosed it all: http://collateralmurder.com/

WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad — including two Reuters news staff.

Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded.

What a shocker… Blackwater USA, an American company founded by a Christian fundamentalist, runs mercenaries across the Middle East. A bunch of heavily armed Blackwater “staff” shoot up a bunch of innocent Iraqis one day, and eventually have the legal case against them tossed on a technicality. Along the way, Blackwater USA renames itself “Xe” to rebrand themselves. Not unlike how AIG is trying to rebrand themselves, I imagine, after AIG almost destroyed the whole of the financial realm in the Western world. Turns out that Xe/Blackwater thugs shot up more people, this time in Afghanistan.

The particulars of what happened last May 5 — including whether the contractors had been drinking and whether they were acting in self-defense — are in dispute, but everyone agrees the shooting occurred after a traffic accident in Kabul.

The charges have attracted attention for coming so soon after a federal judge dismissed a case against Blackwater contractors who allegedly killed 17 civilians in Baghdad’s Nisour Square in 2007. That shooting also unfolded after a traffic incident.

The contractors in the Kabul case, Christopher Drotleff, 29, and Justin Cannon, 27, were arrested last week in Corpus Christi, TX, and Virginia Beach, VA, respectively. The case is being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.

How long until the Obama administration grows up and cuts off all Federal funding for this operation? It seems like their continued employment is not in the political interests of the United States, to put it mildly. If we’re spread so thin with our actual legal military that we need to hire mercenaries, perhaps that a sign that we shouldn’t be still fighting in these countries that the useless Bush administration dumped us into?

The people of Maine were not so fortunate, where it was reported that some Catholic churches conducted secondary collections to help fund anti-gay voting.

Like women’s rights and interracial marriage, delegating the question of equality to the whims of the state level are fundamentally flawed and unethical. Like what happened with abortion in Roe v. Wade in 1973 and the rights of blacks to marry whites in Loving V. Virginia in 1966, I’m thinking this won’t end until someone can challenge it to the Supreme Court. You simply don’t vote on “rights”. The biases of any religion cannot be allowed to affect the lives of all your other citizens who don’t follow that religion, full stop.

It’s gotten so bad now one year later with dangerous religious extremism trying to sway American legal destiny that the Catholic Church announced it would terminate all charity work in our nation’s capital if Washington D.C. legalized gay marriage locally, in revenge.

We’re now getting closer daily to the desires of the far Right for concepts like dominionism and Christian doctrine to be our version of an American Sharia law. Both ideals are patently dangerous, wrong for a secular multi-cultural nation like ours, and frankly evil if imposed on everyone who doesn’t subscribe to those limited precepts. If it happens, our nation is pretty much doomed to become the next Iran.

There were nationwide protests a year ago this weekend, where millions of people opposed the religious hatred and civil rights violations last year in California. These were my photos from the Seattle protests:

Hello,

Thank you all for your continued hard work and service.

I came across this news story, about the TVW and Dow Constantine situation. If you are unfamiliar with this, I implore you to read the below news article. This is troubling for all Washington state taxpayers.

Background: TVW is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit corporation, not a government agency. It is governed by an independent board of directors. The majority of TVW’s operating cash – approximately $2.5 million per year – comes from the Legislature via a contract-for-service through the Secretary of State. TVW receives more than $11 million per year in the form of in-kind contributions of channel space from Washington’s cable television industry.

The story about TVW and Down Constantine is here: http://publicola.net/?p=17512

Politics aside, I am troubled by the fact that materials produced by money levied from taxes paid for by Washington citizens are being held in some form of “copyright” claim by a private entity like TVW, or anyone else. Many US state governments (and many foreign governments) are moving toward any materials produced by the government being “free”, in the public domain or under what is known as a Creative Commons license, which is increasingly popular year over year.

For example, this is a list of state-level US agencies and some Federal that issue content under Creative Commons:

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Government_use_of_CC_licenses#United_States

Virginia’s stance is particularly strong:

http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?091+ful+CHAP0791

Washington is a leading state in the fields of technology. We have many prominent tech corporations, innumerable technology start-ups, and are known nationally on this stage. The ideals of ‘open sourcing’ and free licensing are a core component of the ethos of many of these corporations. Our state government should at the least be in compliance with what is becoming nationally standard.

What I would like to request is consideration for a bill like the above Virginia one, but with stronger language, that any goods “produced” with tax funding in a fixed form: written text, visual recordings, maps, videos, audio, anything official to come out of Olympia or local government, state and local laws, a random video the City of Spokane may make, etc. be required to be produced and released under a license such as the Creative Commons licensing that simply requires “Attribution”.

This link details the specifics of the licensing I think would be best:

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us/

Washington state would still ultimately retain ownership of all the content in this scenario, but by law it should be mandatory that any government-funded (in any way) materials should be freely available, with no copyright restriction beyond attribution. I have zero problem with an entity like TVW turning an ultimate profit from what they’re doing, that originated with state dollars. Anyone is welcome to do that–good for TVW for coming up with a successful model. But they, nor anyone else, should have exclusive claim over content *I* paid for.

What I’m upset about is that any organization then leveraging copyright claims to squash what is protected “fair use” of their materials that were paid for by my tax dollars. In the wake of the Constantine fiasco posted about on Publicola, they are now going after a political blogger for reposting the now notorious video on another “video sharing” service, as detailed at this link: http://horsesass.org/?p=21640

Please help Washington state be a leader in the realm of intellectual property law, and allow us to do better than other states, such as Virginia. Please initiate legislation based on the Virginia example above, but with stronger language than the “preference” tone they set. Make it mandatory, to allow Washington state tax payers to always have free access to what we have already paid for with our taxes.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Joseph Szilagyi

This isn’t surprising, but I hope they litigate the hell out of it. From the article:

Public records from the state Department of Transportation (WSDOT) contain a number of disturbing revelations about the process that led WSDOT to move forward with the deep-bore tunnel on the downtown waterfront early this year.

Emails, internal memos, and other agency documents reveal that WSDOT appointed longtime advocates for the deep-bore tunnel as “experts” on tunnel costs; redistributed tunnel costs to make the price appear lower; and failed to study the surface/transit/I-5 alternative, subbing in a faux four-lane “surface” alternative that included none of the transit and surface-street improvements in the surface/transit/I-5 proposal.

I went on a tour of the Alaskan Way Viaduct that the deep-bore tunnel is slated to replace back in March. I’m wondering now how much of what seemed like a well balanced, reasonable series of explanations and science presented there were in hindsight political spin and out-and-out nonsense. I’ve got photos here, if you’re curious what the viaduct tour is. For people not from here, it’s our waterfront elevated freeway that needs to be desperately replaced, and that has been at the center of endless legal battles on both the state and local level. It’s especially bad if they played dirty politics here, since this deal to build the tunnel had the City of Seattle on the hook for any and all cost overruns. Not the state.

Read the rest: http://publicola.net/?p=16697