[ale] [OT] Georgia Super-DMCA Update

[John Marasco]

The second amendment states:

"the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

weapons are arms and weapons of mass destruction are weapons.

Yet if you walked into a legislative committee and made the argument that the second amendment should be overturned because it legalizes anthrax most legislatures would laugh at you.  The point is that you need to make arguments that the legislatures find plausible (doesn't matter what you think of the arguments).  If you go to far, you'll get the whole movement written off as a bunch of paranoid crazies.  By and large, legislators are not paranoid about government power (even if they say they are), if there is one thing that legislatures are paranoid of its paranoid crazies.  The first approach is more positive.  Concentrate on voterÂ’s perceptions of the bill (real or imagined) and their reactions to their perceptions.  Concentrate on the fact that it is a bad bill because the wording doesn't reflect the actual will of the legislature.  Let the legislature know that we know they don't want to ban telecommuting; routers, WiFi or ebay but that this bill if passed as is will sound (to some people, but not us) as if they do.

Everyone here seems surprised that Chris was such a "nice" guy.  Of course he was, he's answering phones in a political office.  To make headway you need a lot more carrot than stick.  In this case, the carrot is our confidence in our legislatures wisdom to "do the right thing" for the people once they see the people's perspective.  The carrot is to show (as the first post does) that a veto for this bill is support for high tech jobs, families, telecommuting and consumer spending.

Please don't tell the legislature that they want to listen in on private conversations with loved ones about personal family matters.  They will be hard pressed to listen to the rest of the arguments after being hit with a stick like that.  Politics is about how you say things, not what you say.  If you convince the legislature that you are the type of people they want in Georgia, they are much more likely to see things "your way".

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