I don't hear anybody saying that. All I'm saying is that "wrong" (as opposed to unconstitutional) decisions by Congress are to be re-visited in Congress. The use of the courts as a super-legislature to win battles lost in the political arena has gone far enough already in my opinion. I'm sick of it, and I applaud the Supreme Court's willingness to not do it here.
And stop putting words in my mouth. I have not stated that the Court has no function. I just do not think that the Supreme Court of the United States needs to be meddling in picayune crap like whether a copyright ought to be for 5, 10, 50, or 100 years. What I want them to rule on is whether law enforcement -- or even worse a copyright holder -- has the right under the Constitution to conduct a warrantless search of my computer to see if I have any copyrighted works. That, at least, is a genuine Constitutional issue. The one in this case is a transparently trumped-up "constitutional issue" that should have been disposed of by some district court judge, probably by fining the disingenuous lawyer who tried to slip it past him.
I'm sure you are, so long as you get to decide what is right and good. I'm not sure I trust you though, so I'm not ready to make you king. I'd prefer you work through your elected representaives to change this law that you don't like. And if you lose, you lose.
Courts aside, it is patently obvious that this whole "constitutional" argument was backed into by people who started not with the Constitution, but with "how do we get this number we don't like changed?" They lost in Congress, so they went to Court with a stupid, trumped-up "Constitutional theory" that says that Congress cannot change its own laws. Well, they fell on their butts, and I'm not surprised.
Can Congress retroactively repeal the Reagan tax cuts and send you a bill for the last 20 years? Copyright is an agreement entered into between the author or publisher and the public. That agreement has now been altered after the fact.
Irrelevant. Many cases of Constitutional law start with thoroughly cynical motives (e.g. "How do I get a law against what I want to do struck down?" or "How do I get the damning evidence against my client thrown out?"). That doesn't affect the underlying merits of the issue.
As I noted earlier, the Consitutional issue is not with a specific number, but with the process of evading the "limited terms" clause through infinity-by-induction. The problem is that any challenge directed at any specific act of Congress is primarily focused on the former. The majority opinion addresses the infinity-by-induction argument by concluding that Eldred failed to present convincing evidence that this was in fact occuring (which implies that the Court may take a different view if Congress does indeed repeatedly extend copyrights to the point of preventing any post-Steamboat Willie works from maturing into the public domain).
This too is a genuine Constitutional issue. The issue is whether or not Congress has exceeded the power granted it by the people through the Constitution. The Constitution is plain -- it grants Congress the power to create copyrights only insofar as Congress limits that copyright to a specific period of time. It even states the reason. The reason copyrights are even allowed in the first place seeing as the very idea conflicts with the First Amendment, is that granting a limited copyright will stimulate an artist or author to create something in the first place. In no instance can a retroactive extension of a copyright term stimulate something's initial creation. Given that fact, Congress exceeded its authority.
Do you believe that Congress is unbounded in what it can do?
And if you simply define a decision as "wrong", rather than "unconstitutional", and then carry as though your definition were the final word on the issue, you can render any decision at all striking down some legislative action as illegitimate. It's more than just "wrong" to retroactively (and potentially indefinitely) extend copyrights - it plainly and obviously conflicts with both the language and intent of the clause in the constitution that addresses such things. Of course, if we're all suddenly of the opinion that not even original intent means much, I guess we can just suck it up when somewhere down the road, the court agrees with the notion that a "well regulated militia" excludes ordinary, unorganized private citizens, too.
And stop putting words in my mouth. I have not stated that the Court has no function.
Right. You never said they couldn't speak, you just cut out their tongues. My mistake. So what sorts of interpretive issues can the Court engage in without being accused of being unelected philosopher kings, improperly seeking to thwart the will of Congress?
I just do not think that the Supreme Court of the United States needs to be meddling in picayune crap like whether a copyright ought to be for 5, 10, 50, or 100 years. What I want them to rule on is whether law enforcement -- or even worse a copyright holder -- has the right under the Constitution to conduct a warrantless search of my computer to see if I have any copyrighted works. That, at least, is a genuine Constitutional issue.
Huh? So, lemme see if I've got this straight - essentially, the Court has the power to interpret the word "unreasonable" in the Fourth Amendment, and make Congress stick to it, but interpreting the word "limited" in Article I is just way beyond the pale, and not a "genuine" Constitutional issue? Do you have a definitive list of which particular words in the Constitution are off-limits to them - and oh, by the way, something resembling an argument supporting that kind of completely arbitrary division into "genuine" and non-genuine issues for the Court - or is this sort of an ad-hoc thing, the "Nick Danger valid docket word list"?
After all, I'd sure hate for you to be seen in public, asking those unelected philosopher kings to substitute their judgement about what a reasonable search is in place of the divinely inspired judgement of Congress. Everyone knows that that's not a "genuine" Constitutional issue, and so if Congress passes a law mandating the attachment of an anal-probe module to your computer, so that you can be searched at will by the FBI and the RIAA...well, hey, that's the system, and you can just work to change that law legislatively, right? You wouldn't want to introduce such a patently trumped-up Constitutional issue into a court, would you? I'm sure a year's (or more) worth of rectal discomfort is a small price to pay for keeping that word "unreasonable" off the Court's list of "genuine" Constitutional issues, don't you think? God alone knows where the courts will meddle if we give them the job of deciding what is and isn't a reasonable search...
I'm sure you are, so long as you get to decide what is right and good. I'm not sure I trust you though, so I'm not ready to make you king.
Right. This is somehow different than when Nick unilaterally and without argument decides which words in the Constitution are "genuine" issues for the Court, and which aren't. At least, I think that's the impression I'm supposed to walk away with, although I'll be damned if I can see the difference.
Oh, wait - here's the difference. I'm perfectly willing to make my opinion about what's right and good known to the public at large, where they can then adjudge for themselves whether my notion of right and good accords with theirs, and whether this law is consistent with the Constitution, and whether the courts have fallen down on the job. Nick has...a word list to tell us what is and isn't properly a part of the court's purview.
Courts aside, it is patently obvious that this whole "constitutional" argument was backed into by people who started not with the Constitution, but with "how do we get this number we don't like changed?"
Oh, no - say it isn't so. Tell me it's not true, and that plaintiffs in constitutional cases are really always concerned with abstract principle, and not the practical effects of laws upon them.
Gimme a break. Until we institute the Nick Danger Purity of Motives Test™ as a part of filing suits, we're just going to have to settle for deciding whether or not a position is right or wrong on its merits, rather than impugning the presumed motives of people who walk into courtrooms.
They lost in Congress, so they went to Court with a stupid, trumped-up "Constitutional theory" that says that Congress cannot change its own laws.
As opposed to the wise, well-supported "Constitutional theory" that says that Congress has an absolutely free hand in this area, and is subject to not even the barest hint of external restriction. Here's hoping that the courts don't decide to add words like "unreasonable" and "abridge" to this list of non-genuine Constitutional issues...