Almost Certainly the
Most Important Property of All

Those of us who appreciate a free market economy that actually has vim and vigor – know we need Intellectual Property (IP) protection. Even more so now in our 21st Century Information Economy:

“Economy in which knowledge is the primary raw material and source of value.”

And how do we protect “knowledge” – “the primary raw material and source of value?” With IP protections – also known as copyrights, trademarks and patents.

God bless our Agrarian Economy Founding Fathers – they got this. And they got this – back when most people were tilling fields rather than putting quill to parchment (let alone typing on keyboards).

Of such incredible import did the Founders deem IP protection – they ensconced it by name in the Constitution: More

A Prolonged, Pronounced Problem

It boggles the mind how monstrously dumb the Republican Party can be. They ain’t called “The Stupid Party” for nothing.

To wit: The GOP has spent the last seven years winning more than 1,000 elective offices up and down the ballot – in large part because Obamacare has been such an unmitigated disaster. They spent great swaths of that time – campaigning very vigorously on repealing it.

Now that the GOP controls both houses of Congress and the White House – they are steadfastly refusing to repeal Obamacare. It’s as if they missed entirely the last near-decade. Or spent it lying their faces off. Either way – they are being titanically stupid.

Also to wit: So many think the political rise and election of Donald Trump demonstrates said stupidity. The exact opposite is true. The GOP’s dumbness predates Trump – by decades. Trump is a response to the dumbness – not a symptom of it. More

Stealing…is Stealing

One of the ongoing ridiculous myths that exists on the Left – and, even more maddeningly, with some on the alleged Right – is that stealing intellectual property (IP) is…not stealing.

In this warped worldview, entering a Best Buy and stealing a DVD movie – is bad. Downloading-without-paying-for the exact same movie – is somehow less bad. It is, in fact, not bad at all.

The weak and feeble argument for this – is that you are not stealing anything physical, so you aren’t stealing. You aren’t depriving anyone of anything tangible.

Which is absurd. You aren’t stealing the DVD from Best Buy to get the shiny, flat piece of plastic. You are stealing the DVD from Best Buy – to get the IP that is imprinted on the shiny, flat piece of plastic. More

Apple Training Their Sights on the US Economy

In Reality, stealing is bad. In Washington, D.C. – it is the operational model. A feature – not a bug.

So it is understandable that when a Donald Trump campaigns for President in part on halting theft abroad, DC Conventional Wisdom (which is neither conventional nor wisdom) – is that he will lose the election. His introduction and insertion of Reality – is utterly alien to the DC Geniuses.

The theft Trump highlighted with the greatest frequency – is the $600 billion (and likely more) per annum in intellectual property (IP) theft in which China and the rest of the world engages.

We invent and create things – and they steal them. Which does egregious damage to our economy now. And it is a woeful disincentive to our continuing to invent and create things – which does egregious damage to our economy going forward. More

This One Goes to Eleven

iEverything tiny little company Apple (market cap: $820 billion) is in the midst of executing a unilateral war against Qualcomm.

Apple Sues Qualcomm Over Patent Royalties: “Apple also wants back some of the billions of dollars it claims it was overcharged in ‘Qualcomm’s illegal scheme’ to control the market for mobile phone chips.”

No, what Qualcomm is doing – is engaging in a legal, very reasonable effort to control the market for its patents.  Apple wanted to use Qualcomm’s patents, Apple signed contracts to use them, Apple uses them – and now Apple is trying to get out of paying for using them.

Oh – and to put this in technological perspective: The iPhone – without Qualcomm’s patented technologies – is basically a skinny rotary phone. Just about all the things that make an iPhone an iPhone – come from Qualcomm. More

It’s Way Past Time to Deploy

We have an economic nightmare mess exploding overseas – and it’s now making its way to our shores. This is potentially disastrous for our economy – and the planet’s. Both now – and, especially, going forward.

At issue is foreign governments royally screwing United States company Qualcomm – in patent enforcement decisions. Qualcomm holds the patents. Qualcomm has contracts with computer-iPhone giant Apple – signed by Apple – in which Apple agrees to pay Qualcomm for use of said patents in their iPhones.

Apple now, suddenly doesn’t want to pay Qualcomm – and has asked these governments to allow them not to do so. And these governments are absurdly ruling in Apple’s favor.

This is potentially catastrophic for our economy – and everyone else’s. If we don’t protect intellectual property (IP) today – no one will create IP tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the days, weeks, months and years to follow.

Say you’re a farmer. Would you invest your time, effort and money to till, plant, nurture and grow your crops – if any and every clown could come along after the fact and take your produce? More

Let’s Hope So

The United States has spent the last four decades – “free trading” away millions of domestic jobs to everywhere else on the planet. Whether accidental or intentional on our part – the gigs left.

It was intentional on the part of all the world’s other governments. They aren’t nearly as free trade-y as we are – they rigged their laws to favor companies that came and stayed within their confines. And they would break the law – and our trade agreements – when that wasn’t crony enough.

This isn’t very nice of them – but you really can’t blame them. They’re only doing what’s best for them and theirs.

Put the blame on us – we have long been titanically stupid about of all of it.

Year after year, decade after decade, trade deal after trade deal – we allowed them to screw us to an ever increasing degree.

And now, after nearly a half century of allowing these not nice governments to build massive trade clout against us – we shouldn’t act surprised when they begin to press things further. By hook or by crook – by any means necessary. More

Bad Obama Ideas – Going Global

We just narrowly escaped the cronyism-infested eight years of the Barack Obama Administration. If you were a Leftist – the $4-trillion-per-year-government world was your oyster. The biggest bureaucratic favors of your wildest imaginings – were only a campaign contribution away.

Cronyism is one of the largest, slimiest critters in the Swamp against which now-President Donald Trump ran – promising to drain and dismantle. Which he – sporadically, in fits and starts – has started to do.

But as difficult as is unwinding the century-plus-long Swamp expansion – it got dramatically harder when the Obama-esque cronyism leaked out beyond our borders.

A fortnight ago we wrote of the DC Cronies working together to maximize their domestic cronyism when it comes to illegally strip-mining intellectual property (IP) protections:

“One of the other biggest…Crony beneficiaries – was Apple. You know, that tiny little $800 billion company – that really needs as much government assistance as they can muster. (Note: that was sarcasm.) More

DC Should Be Permanently Grounded

“WKRP in Cincinnati” is a fantastic legacy television show – about a 1970s rock-and-roll radio station. And perhaps its most famous episode – is “Turkeys Away.” (God bless the Internet – here is a thirty-second clipped summary thereof.)

WKRP general manager Arthur Carlson decides as a Thanksgiving promotion to drop live turkeys from a helicopter on a strip mall. Because he is somehow unaware that these particular fowl – are flightless. So basically he – as disc jockey Johnny Fever described it – “firebombed with live turkeys” the mall and everyone there.

Newsman Les Nessman returns from the debacle – and describes what subsequently happened: “Then Mr. Carlson had the helicopter land in the middle of the parking lot. I guess he thought he could save the day by turning the rest of the turkeys loose. It gets pretty strange after that….I really don’t know how to describe it. It was like the turkeys mounted a counter-attack. It was almost as if they were… organized.”

In Washington, D.C. – the Turkeys are most certainly organized. And have been for s VERY long time. And the American free market economy – is under constant arial assault therefrom. More