Republic, Lost (my favorite version)

What Hacker News said

Strong rec alexqgb · 2011-12 · on “The Only Way to Stop SOPA”

I strongly encourage you to develop a (much) better understanding of what Lessig has been arguing. A good place to start is here: [this video] Also worth noting: the problem you describe (corrupting influences on the economy originating in Washington, as opposed to private interests capturing Washington) is something Lessig addressed in his recent appearance on Jon Stewart's program. There, he pointed out that these apparently divergent forms of corruption are entirely compatible, and that they actually share the same root, which is the obscene reliance of elected officials on a vanishingly small number of campaign donors. Depending on the day of the week, these donors can find themselves initiat

Recommends lifeguard · 2013-06 · on “Ask HN: US this bad about civil liberties?”

Dear Internet, America has become a very strange place. At the same time our military was "bringing freedom to the Iraqi peoples", our legislature and executive conspired to remove or automate much judicial review of spying. In effect American citizens lost another type of liberty. We seem to be better at protecting our access to riffles. Most of the liberties created by America's founding fathers (women were not allowed to vote) were designed to thwart the power of a monarchy and the power of the Roman-Catholic church. Many of these founding fathers were members of a fraternity called the Free Masons and read authors like John Locke. My point is they were a fairly homogeneous group of Engli

Recommends dbrgn · 2022-07 · on “EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved”

Because of institutional corruption. Lawrence Lessig has some great talks about this topic, here's one of them: [LINK] Here's another one: [this video] (Lawrence Lessig, a law professor, was one of the founders of Creative Commons. He later tried to change US copyright laws to be more consumer-friendly, but concluded that it's almost impossible to do so as long as corporate interests rule politics. He then shifted his research topics to institutional corruption in politics. He actually ran for presidency a few years ago, with funding only from the popuplation, and limited to a certain amount. It failed, he wasn't even invited to TV debates because "if he doesn't take company money he doesn't have