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posted by on Saturday March 28 2015, @09:26PM   Printer-friendly
from the Don't-fence-me-in dept.

Ars Technica is reporting on new regulations to limit region-based restrictions in the European Union:

At the heart of the European Union lies the Single Market—the possibility for people to buy and sell goods and services anywhere in the EU. So it is ironic that the European sector least constrained by geography—the digital market—is also the least unified. To remedy that situation, the European Commission has announced its Digital Single Market Strategy, which addresses three main areas.

The first is "Better access for consumers and businesses to digital goods and services" and includes two of the thorniest issues: geo-blocking and copyright. As the EU's strategy notes, "too many Europeans cannot use online services that are available in other EU countries, often without any justification; or they are re-routed to a local store with different prices. Such discrimination cannot exist in a Single Market."

There is strong resistance to removing geo-blocking, particularly from copyright companies that have traditionally sold rights on a national basis and which therefore want geo-blocking to enforce that fragmentation. The Pirate Party Member of the European Parliament (MEP), Julia Reda, quoted a fellow MEP justifying geo-blocking as follows: "I can’t buy Finnish bread in any German supermarket or bakery. Far too few people here would buy it, so the market doesn't offer it to me. And you don’t see me demanding that the European Commission bloody-well make that product available to me."

Julia Reda responded to those who defend geo-blocking by actually buying Finnish bread online without incident or issue.

The European Union's Digital Single Market Strategy covers several other areas, including Telecom/network investment and management, copyright reform, and future goals for a single EU digital market.

As an American, it's hard to believe government could possibly work on behalf of voters, so let's see if this initiative can make it into law. But it is an enticing idea.

Related Stories

Reda Report Adopted: A Turning Point in the EU Copyright Debate 24 comments

Julia Reda, the only Pirate in the European Parliament, who has been mentioned here in various contexts now blogs with more good news.

[June 16], the Legal Affairs Committee of the European Parliament passed an amended version of my copyright evaluation report with a broad majority. (Find the detailed breakdown of the votes on my overview page. The final adopted text is not yet available--I will link to it as soon as it goes online.)

The amended report was supported by all political groups--the only two opposing votes were cast by MEPs from the far-right French Front National.

In this report, the Parliament recognises that copyright reform is urgently needed not just to improve the Digital Single Market, but also , to facilitate access to knowledge and culture for all people in Europe. It calls on the Commission to consider a wide variety of measures to bring copyright law up to speed with changing realities and improve cross-border access to our cultural diversity, going further than the plans so far announced by the Commissioners.

For the first time, the Parliament asks for minimum standards for the rights of the public, which are enshrined in a list of exceptions to copyright[...]

  • to allow libraries and archives to digitise their collections efficiently,
  • to enable the lending of e-books over the Internet and
  • to allow the [automatic] analysis of large bodies of text and data (text & data mining).

Related: Julia Reda, the Only Pirate in the European Parliament, Weighs in on Copyright


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @09:39PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @09:39PM (#163651)

    As an American, it's hard to believe government could possibly work on behalf of voters

    As soon as they figure out a way to let corporations vote the government will work on behalf of those "voters". In the mean time the politicians will work on behalf of their "consumers" (e,g,. the ones who purchase favors from the politicians).

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by isostatic on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:18PM

      by isostatic (365) on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:18PM (#163656) Journal

      As soon as they figure out a way to let corporations vote the government will work on behalf of those "voters". In the mean time the politicians will work on behalf of their "consumers" (e,g,. the ones who purchase favors from the politicians).

      The beauty is noone actually knows who makes European laws -- There's noone to bribe with re-election funds, because the people who are elected don't really make much of a difference!

    • (Score: 2) by Wootery on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:46PM

      by Wootery (2341) on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:46PM (#163660)

      Even if corporations could vote, there'd still be many more people that corps, no?

      • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday March 29 2015, @02:10AM

        by anubi (2828) on Sunday March 29 2015, @02:10AM (#163689) Journal

        Very true, but the problem is we will not organize like a business and present a unified front to a politician, telling him if he fails to implement (thing) by (date), he had better find another line of work.

        Business has no problem using this paradigm on employees. They call it "leadership skill". They actually send perfectly good people to take classes in these techniques.

        But the public, by and large, won't use this technique on the people they elect to represent them.

        And that's why we get what we get... all run over with one sided law and our side not stood up for.

        Its high time we drop this "honorable mr. so-and-so" bit and start asking pointed questions prior to elections, and hold them accountable.

        Believe me, "they" have absolutely no problems holding US accountable!

        --
        "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:21PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:21PM (#163663)

      In the mean time the politicians will work on behalf of their "consumers" (e,g,. the ones who purchase favors from the politicians).

      Incorrect.
      "Consumers" are those who take what they're given, and have no power of negotiation over what they are sold. At best they can choose between suppliers, or abstain altogether.
      *Customers* are those who are in a position to make requests or demands of the seller.

      Corporations are the customers.
      Voters are the consumers.

  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:24PM

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:24PM (#163658) Journal

    The Pirate Party Member of the European Parliament (MEP), Julia Reda, quoted a fellow MEP justifying geo-blocking as follows: "I can’t buy Finnish bread in any German supermarket or bakery. Far too few people here would buy it, so the market doesn't offer it to me. And you don’t see me demanding that the European Commission bloody-well make that product available to me."

    That's a really bad analogy. As a German, I can go to a Finnish bakery and buy Finnish bread there. There will be no one on the door of the Finnish bakery who wants to see my identity card, and when it says I'm from Germany, won't let me in. And a geo-blocking ban would not mean that Finnish content would have to be offered on German servers. It just means that when I go to a Finnish server, it is forbidden not to let me in just because I'm connecting from Germany. That is, what would be forbidden is the equivalent to ID checking in front of the bakery.

    Now one might say that to buy from a Finnish bakery, I must physically go to Finland. But what if the bakery took mail orders? Would the bakery be allowed to deny sending me the Finnish bread just because I'm ordering from Germany?

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:57PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:57PM (#163661)

      Now one might say that to buy from a Finnish bakery, I must physically go to Finland. But what if the bakery took mail orders? Would the bakery be allowed to deny sending me the Finnish bread just because I'm ordering from Germany?

      Well from TFS, it looks like it's quite possible to order Finnish bread over the internet. This is one of the great things about the internet after all: it's easy for small sellers of weird niche products to set up a small website and sell their wares to people all over the world. There probably isn't much of a market for Finnish bread in Germany or Spain or the US, not nearly enough to get grocery stores to import it from Finland. However, there's probably enough people in those countries interested in Finnish bread (and willing to pay the shipping costs due to its uniqueness) that it's worth it for some Finnish bread sellers to put up a website and ship Finnish bread to those places. Now, replace "Finnish bread" with any other obscure product, and the same holds true.

      And no, why would the bread seller care where his buyers are located, as long as it's not any extra trouble to sell to them? He doesn't care if they're in Germany or Zimbabwe, as long as the postal service will deliver there. I don't think there's anything wrong with the bakery refusing to ship to certain places; there's a fair number of sellers who refuse to ship to Italy, for instance, because Italian Post has a terrible reputation for "losing" packages. But if the seller doesn't mind, and the buyer is willing to pay the shipping charges, why not? However, some people would like to restrict this; not for bakers, but for things involving copyright.

      • (Score: 4, Informative) by NoMaster on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:10AM

        by NoMaster (3543) on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:10AM (#163684)

        And no, why would the bread seller care where his buyers are located, as long as it's not any extra trouble to sell to them?

        Because he's making more from selling the exclusive right to manufacture & sell his "Finnish Bread" - which may in fact be an inferior "international" or "localised" version of the original product - elsewhere to various 3rd parties, than he would by direct sales?

        I don't think there's anything wrong with the bakery refusing to ship to certain places; there's a fair number of sellers who refuse to ship to Italy, for instance, because Italian Post has a terrible reputation for "losing" packages. But if the seller doesn't mind, and the buyer is willing to pay the shipping charges, why not?

        Well, that's the thing - sometimes the seller does mind, for reasons that have nothing to do with practical reasons and everything to do with artificially restricting access.

        In "digital markets", the Popular Science website is a good example. In many regions the publisher has licenced the name & only some of the content to local operators, and uses geoblocking / geo-redirection to protect that. More often than not, the local content is not the same as that on the 'parent' site - often it's simply heavily abbreviated, sometimes the abbreviated content is reduced even further to insert a paragraph or two of local colour/relevance while keeping the same length, frequently it's not available at all for a month or two after the original article on the parent site and/or expires within a month or two of local publication. And many times articles from the parent site - even in an abbreviated, butchered, time limited version - are never published at all.

        Remember that the next time you post a link to popsci.com - chances are it's going to be useless to anyone outside of your own geographical region...

        --
        Live free or fuck off and take your naïve Libertarian fantasies with you...
      • (Score: 2) by RedGreen on Sunday March 29 2015, @05:39AM

        by RedGreen (888) on Sunday March 29 2015, @05:39AM (#163718)

        "there's a fair number of sellers who refuse to ship to Italy, for instance, because Italian Post has a terrible reputation for "losing" packages."

        I can see why I have sent one package to Italy in my life over two months getting to the buyer, the one sent at the same time to Thailand about three weeks.

        --
        "I modded down, down, down, and the flames went higher." -- Sven Olsen
    • (Score: 1) by bloodnok on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:09AM

      by bloodnok (2578) on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:09AM (#163683)

      That's a really bad analogy. As a German, I can go to a Finnish bakery and buy Finnish bread there. There will be no one on the door of the Finnish bakery who wants to see my identity card, and when it says I'm from Germany, won't let me in. And a geo-blocking ban would not mean that Finnish content would have to be offered on German servers. It just means that when I go to a Finnish server, it is forbidden not to let me in just because I'm connecting from Germany. That is, what would be forbidden is the equivalent to ID checking in front of the bakery.

      I wish I had something to add, but you have so succinctly expressed the fundamental issues at stake here that there should be nothing for anyone else to do here but agree. Mr maxwell demon sir, I thank you for one of the clearest analogies I have ever encountered. It is a pleasure to be a member of the same community.

      Onward with soylent. In a sandwich of Finnish bread with German butter.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:27PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @10:27PM (#163659)

    > As an American, it's hard to believe government could possibly work on behalf of voters,

    More like as a simplistic thinker who sees the world in black and white headlines but misses the day to day realities that are right in front of him like roads, sewage, schools, police, etc. Its easy to get caught up in the news when things go off the rails, but if that was the normal case society would have collapsed long ago. Its called news because its something new and unusual. Just because there is always room for improvement doesn't mean things are consistently in the shitter.

    • (Score: 5, Informative) by Grishnakh on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:03PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:03PM (#163662)

      Oh please; when was the last time the American government actually did something on behalf of voters, rather than moneyed interests? I honestly can't think of anything they did which didn't benefit some campaign donors.

      This is something that cannot happen in America: the EU government doing something which the moneyed interests (the copyright cartels) don't want, and which will hurt their profitability, for no reason other than it's good for the regular people. This never happens in America these days.

      As for roads, sewage, police, etc., they spend money on roads because it benefits politically-connected construction companies (why do you think it costs such ridiculous sums to build roads, and they're always doing construction on roads that really didn't need it that much?). And police? Have you not noticed that the police in this country are hyper-violent thugs who execute people on a whim? How is that helping anyone except the ruling class?

      The fundamental problem is that the US is nothing like the EU, and really resembles someplace like Zimbabwe or Somalia more. While every country has some corruption, in the US it's blatant and obvious, just like many 3rd-world hellholes.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @07:56PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @07:56PM (#163924)

        The affordable care act? That's helped people I know in ways that now make care affordable. I think social security for the elderly also is helpful...

        I am too small of a person to be able to help reduce abuses of the system that other people may involve themselves with. I can do little aside from not abusing the systems myself, and appreciate the few good things I can easily point out besides road maintenance and fire/police response when needed.

        I am not sure what you expect the government to do, considering half the country wants to shut down the other half. That doesn't leave much in the way of benefits the government can provide for the individual voting public.

      • (Score: 2) by Common Joe on Monday March 30 2015, @05:28AM

        by Common Joe (33) <{common.joe.0101} {at} {gmail.com}> on Monday March 30 2015, @05:28AM (#164080) Journal

        I have something purely anecdotal and your point still stands completely.

        When we still lived in the States, my wife and I went to a meeting because they wanted to build a new library. (Big bucks involved.) Wanting to know more about it, we went. After the board pitched their idea and half-heartedly asked for our opinions (of which they weren't really interested because they had already made their decision without public inclusion), a guy stood up and point-by-point ripped them a new a one. I spoke to him and found out he was a local representative. I went home and did some research. I liked this guy.

        Nine months, later, I bump into him at another meeting and he remembered me. Again, he proceeded to logically tear down plans that were not well thought out. And when I spoke to him afterwards, he remembered me by name even though I had only met him and interacted with him the one time before. It was the first time I had ever met a person with a memory like that for faces and names and I realized how talented most politicians probably were.

        When it came time to vote, I made sure to vote for him. Unfortunately, he lost. But, yes, for a brief moment in the past 10 years, there was a beacon of light in a little town somewhere in the U.S. They do exist.

        Again, it doesn't negate your point at all. I just wanted to bring a small ray of light into a subject that is normally very dark.

      • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Monday March 30 2015, @05:43PM

        by DeathMonkey (1380) on Monday March 30 2015, @05:43PM (#164386) Journal

        Oh please; when was the last time the American government actually did something on behalf of voters, rather than moneyed interests?
         
        The FCC Title II decision happened less than a month ago.
         
        Evaluate your confirmation bias.

        • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday March 30 2015, @06:58PM

          by Grishnakh (2831) on Monday March 30 2015, @06:58PM (#164425)

          Ok, name something before that. The jury's still out on that one anyway; the ruling only just came out. Finally, it does benefit moneyed interests, namely places like Google and Netflix. The net-neutrality fight was largely a fight between behemoths, with the ISP cartel on one side and the internet titans on the other. Personally, I'm on the side of the internet titans here, but I'm not going to pretend they're not moneyed interests whose interests only sometimes coincide with my own.

          • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Monday March 30 2015, @09:05PM

            by DeathMonkey (1380) on Monday March 30 2015, @09:05PM (#164480) Journal

            Ok, name something before that.
             
            Sure, one more example is will definitely convice the guy who already moved the goal posts.

            • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday March 31 2015, @04:49PM

              by Grishnakh (2831) on Tuesday March 31 2015, @04:49PM (#164882)

              You haven't provided an example. You gave an "example" which I already showed benefits moneyed interests, so it doesn't qualify. It doesn't help that the ink hasn't even dried and it hasn't been put in place yet.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:33PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 28 2015, @11:33PM (#163666)

      More like as a simplistic thinker who sees the world in black and white headlines but misses the day to day realities that are right in front of him like roads, sewage, schools, police, etc.

      Roads, sewage, schools, and police don't indicate the government generally listens to the people. All of those things are very useful to the rich and corporations, after all (and schools are becoming increasingly corporate-friendly, being seen as merely a means to produce more worker drones).

      With mass surveillance (from the NSA's mass surveillance to things like cameras everywhere in public places), the TSA, DUI checkpoints, numerous absurd wars, the drug war, and a host of other nonsense, there is no way they are working in the people's interest. Building more roads will not make up for disrespecting people's most basic liberties and blatantly ignoring the constitution.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by tibman on Sunday March 29 2015, @02:27AM

        by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Sunday March 29 2015, @02:27AM (#163694)

        lol. And the FDA only exists to ensure taxpayers don't get poisoned and stop paying their taxes. Go visit your nearest national park and think about who is benefiting from it.

        --
        SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
        • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @03:37AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @03:37AM (#163706)

          Go visit your nearest national park and think about who is benefiting from it.

          The GOP is working hard to fix [nationalparkstraveler.com] that.

        • (Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Sunday March 29 2015, @06:28AM

          by Hairyfeet (75) <{bassbeast1968} {at} {gmail.com}> on Sunday March 29 2015, @06:28AM (#163729) Journal

          LOL yourself the FDA was created in 1906, name something from the last 30 years that have actually been FOR the people while being AGAINST big money interests...btw good luck with that, as both D and R are so corrupt and have been for so long if a D or R said it was raining I'd want a second opinion.

          --
          ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
          • (Score: 2) by tibman on Sunday March 29 2015, @07:59PM

            by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Sunday March 29 2015, @07:59PM (#163926)

            The FCC allocates unlicensed radio spectrum that any citizen can use. The most popular wireless devices in existence live in those unlicensed spectrums (i am intentionally ignoring cell phones). Cordless phones and wifi might never have taken off if companies had their way and owned the frequencies. Some years ago the FCC sold off a bunch of the old UHF spectrum and the public got pretty screwed. Most of the sold spectrum is still unused. The FCC is going to auction again this year (2015) and Tom Wheeler has promised the public will get more unlicensed space. How much depends on how much spectrum the FCC can "buy back" from various companies.

            Anyways, if you want to point to things the government has given its people in the last 30 years you will have to find things that only came into existence in the last 30 years or so. Even then a lot of what the government does is regulate said thing. GPS access might fall into something the US Gov has given away recently.

            --
            SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
            • (Score: 2) by Hairyfeet on Sunday March 29 2015, @09:51PM

              by Hairyfeet (75) <{bassbeast1968} {at} {gmail.com}> on Sunday March 29 2015, @09:51PM (#163957) Journal

              The FCC...established 1934...Try again.

              --
              ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
              • (Score: 2) by tibman on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:05PM

                by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:05PM (#163964)

                Next time, please read the entire comment you are replying to. Or just don't reply. I doubt you had wifi in 1934. I also specifically said new frequencies from the old UHF spectrum are opening for public use this year.

                --
                SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:43PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:43PM (#163978)

          You are making the exact same mistake as the poster I replied to. The government does X, which benefits the people, so the government generally benefits the people.

          I repeat: "With mass surveillance (from the NSA's mass surveillance to things like cameras everywhere in public places), the TSA, DUI checkpoints, numerous absurd wars, the drug war, and a host of other nonsense, there is no way they are working in the people's interest. Building more roads will not make up for disrespecting people's most basic liberties and blatantly ignoring the constitution." As long as the government is violating people's fundamental liberties, they *cannot* be working for the people.

          • (Score: 2) by tibman on Monday March 30 2015, @02:02AM

            by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Monday March 30 2015, @02:02AM (#164015)

            Please, don't put words in my mouth : ) I am not stupid. Pointing out all the three letter organizations that are screwing us over is wasted on me. I already know.

            --
            SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
  • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:35AM

    by kaszz (4211) on Sunday March 29 2015, @01:35AM (#163687) Journal

    quoted a fellow MEP justifying geo-blocking as follows: "I can’t buy Finnish bread in any German supermarket or bakery. Far too few people here would buy it, so the market doesn't offer it to me. And you don’t see me demanding that the European Commission bloody-well make that product available to me."

    When will these cognitively impaired dinosaurs be removed from a position of influence?

    (btw, corporations hasn't yet succeeded to co-opt EU enough, but be sure they will)

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @05:59AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @05:59AM (#163722)

    ... could learn from this

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by fritsd on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:09AM

    by fritsd (4586) on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:09AM (#163756) Journal

    In the summary, phoenix666 wrote: "As an American, it's hard to believe government could possibly work on behalf of voters, so let's see if this initiative can make it into law. But it is an enticing idea."

    It's not that black and white, weren't there two US representatives that wanted to repeal the PATRIOT law this week, and I remember a mr. Kuchinich tried to impeach president George W. Bush for the Iraq War (I was surprised that it didn't actually succeed).

    But the comment got me thinking to how and why things work a bit better in the EU. Now I'm no politician so take the following with a grain of salt please.

    The Europarliament is democratically elected. It has a power equivalent to the European Commission and the Council of Europe (that's the collection of ministers of Foreign Affairs).

    What does it mean that the Europarliament is democratically elected?

    Ms. Julia Reda is from the Piraten Partei. That means only Germans were allowed to vote for her in the last europarl elections. And very few did (1 out of 96). Germany is the largest country of the EU and has the most seats (96 out of 751). So it would seem the German Piraten have 1 voice in 751. But I don't think that's how it works:

    On a transnational level, most of the political parties have built connections with each other. This resulted in seven different transnational political groups, and a lot of far right parties that didn't want to join together with other far right parties because "they're bloody foreigners".

    The Piraten Partei Deutschland has joined the political group of The Greens/EFA [greens-efa.eu] in the parliament, one of the smaller blocs, and one that itself is composed of two orthogonal groups: the Greens (environmentalists) and the EFA, European Free Alliance, who want more independence for regions (think Scotland, Catalunya etc.).

    This means that their voice is "amplified" by the representation of the Greens/EFA in the influential committees, *as long as* Julia Reda doesn't say anything "piraty" that pisses off her anti-nuclear or Catalunyan-independence colleagues.
    And the Greens/EFA has very interesting politicians like José Bové [greens-efa.eu] (yeah, THAT guy) and Ska Keller [greens-efa.eu] (TTIP watch out!).

    Julia Reda may only be one single dot in the drawing of the seats [wikipedia.org] but with respect to copyright policy she has the support of the whole green slice (50 seats, 6.7%)

    This was all a bit long and rambling, but the crux is: a group that represents 6.7% of the 500 million Europeans *has a voice*, as opposed to the US where your two-party system means I don't even know how to find out how many people voted for the Greens or Pirates in the Senate or House of Representatives (0?). Whereas surely problems like the clean-up of the Hanford site [wikipedia.org] should be at the top of the list in American politics.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:52PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 29 2015, @10:52PM (#163981)

      It's not that black and white, weren't there two US representatives that wanted to repeal the PATRIOT law this week

      Go back to when the Unpatriotic Act was first being voted on. Look how many of them voted for it. Almost every single one of them, yes? Why is it that right after a disaster, nearly all of them will happily vote for laws which violate our fundamental liberties, but then as the general public stops being more unintelligent than usual (it's always unintelligent, but more so when emotions are high), you see more and more of them come out against it? Because all they care about is getting voted for. They don't care about the constitution. They don't care about our liberties. They have no principles at all. They'll happily violate the constitution and people's fundamental liberties if the voters let them.

      And even now, there's almost zero chance that such a thing will succeed, as the Unpatriotic Act keeps being renewed. Don't let this blatant publicity act fool you. I support repealing the Unpatriotic Act, but I'm not naive enough to get my hopes up about this succeeding or about the intentions of these politicians.

      and I remember a mr. Kuchinich tried to impeach president George W. Bush for the Iraq War (I was surprised that it didn't actually succeed).

      If you were surprised by that result, you understood nothing.

      But the comment got me thinking to how and why things work a bit better in the EU.

      It works a bit better in certain areas.