Yesterday an anonymous reader e-mailed, asking: “Your thoughts on Rick Santorum?” He or she apparently has read neither this post nor this post.

If I may address the matter a bit more seriously than in the January post:

Obviously, Santorum has survived much longer than I thought he would. I still tend to think that the “Massachusetts moderate” will be the nominee. Santorum wants to be the anti-Romney (i.e., the candidate of the conservative wing of the Republican party), but he has more than a few moderate skeletons in his closet. He has to explain some votes for those huge social spending projects that the conservatives don’t like. Furthermore, he’s got to explain his support for the presidential candidacy of that famously moderate Republican-on-occasion Arlen “Not proven, therefore not guilty” Specter back in the 90s. He’s also got a bit of the protectionist streak in him at a time when rank-and-file Republicans aren’t in the mood for it.

So I think Romney will paint Santorum as moderate, or at least as no more conservative than Romney. I think that any sense of equivalence between the two favors Romney, since he’s got more money and more endorsements.

Gingrich has flaked out, though he had a brief surge of success that I hadn’t anticipated. Ron Paul’s getting about as much of the vote as he can expect. I think the Tea Party movement and the libertarian wing of the party are going to have to wait another cycle or two before they find a candidate who gathers major primary support.

But, again, who knows? The GOP race has been strange, and just about the only detail anyone’s gotten right is that Romney would lead, though even that hasn’t held throughout. Maybe they’ll have a much-dreaded (though much-hoped-for by political junkies) brokered convention and they’ll pick a dark horse like Christie or Daniels or Ryan. Or Palin. Or Rubio. Or Jeb Bush, maybe with a different last name and a fake moustache.

Heck, maybe Obama will declare his candidacy as a Republican and pick up a few states here and there. Why not?

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Finished the book Against Intellectual Monopoly. Actually, “finished” may be a bit of a stretch since I skimmed some parts; I’ve got a flood of DBQs coming in this week and I wanted this book out of the way. The book’s got gobs of history and thorough arguments, but I’m not totally sold. ‘Tis true that there’d be plenty of creativity in the absence of intellectual property law, but I still worry about innovation in fields with high fixed and low variable costs like pharmaceuticals. I’d feel better about the matter if, concurrent with reducing IP protection, we also liberalized testing requirements and drove down some of the up-front costs of drug development (which the authors do suggest). But while I can see the public supporting the abolition of drug patents, I can’t see them supporting the reduction of the FDA’s testing requirements.

Furthermore, I don’t think the “first-mover” argument is as strong as the authors think it is. The first-mover argument is that even in the absence of IP law, innovators would reap adequate and socially optimal profits simply because they were first to create the product. I can buy that when it comes to tangible products, but not so much when it comes to digital media. As technology improves, it becomes easier to copy digital media and enjoy it prior to public release–i.e., before the innovator and would-be first mover moves. Sure, the creators can figure out other ways to earn profits, or maybe the market (or profit margin) for such material is too big to be socially optimal anyways and the lack of IP protection will cause it to shrink, but either way the first-mover argument seems a little bit flimsy when it comes digital media.

At least in regards to the arts, IP law may one day be rendered moot without being abolished or diminished. A lot of folks take MGM’s motto, “Ars gratia artis,” seriously and not ironically and are willing to give their work away, free of charge. Take me, for instance. I don’t charge anybody to read this website (though I will sell you ad space). This sort of art is more readily available than ever before, and technological advancements are making special effects and editing less and less expensive. That may drive Hollywood and the music industry out of business before a lack of IP protection does.

I’d like to know the opinions of my buddies who probably hold patents and copyrights. I’ll be contacting them shortly and soliciting their opinions on the matter. Hopefully they won’t charge me.

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If they ever do abolish IP law, the government should still provide protection to all materials published prior to abolition. If patents and copyrights were legally acquired, they should be enforced until expiration.

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A few days ago, Noutheteo asked:

From an economic standpoint, what is your opinion of SOPA/PIPA and the recent “blackout”? Is there a need for government to intervene with intellectual property laws, and if so, is the SOPA/PIPA route appropriate? On a similar note: any thoughts on the book Against Intellectual Monopoly?

I’m doing my best to read the book before I get another batch of essays to grade. It may well change my opinions on the matter of intellectual property, so there’ll be a part two coming along one day. Now, allow me to ramble:

Like the overwhelming majority of people who have commented on the matter, and probably like most congressmen who would vote on the matter, I haven’t read either SOPA or PIPA. The rumors and the one-page warnings worry me, though. I don’t like the idea that I could be punished because one of my commenters posts a link to protected materials.

If the feds already have the ability to shut down a website like Megaupload without SOPA/PIPA, then one wonders and worries about what additional purpose would SOPA/PIPA serve. If SOPA or PIPA were to pass, I think we’d someday see (hopefully futile) efforts to regulate political content on the internet, a la the old Fairness Doctrine.

I hope the government would act to protect my intellectual property just as they would act to protect other types of my property. The problem is one of cost and benefit as much as it is one of morality: at what point does it become simply unfeasible for the government to protect my property? There was no 50-man task force to track down the guy who tried breaking into my house three years ago– they had nothing to go on but a messed-up footprint. It is so simple and inexpensive to pirate IP, and so complicated and expensive to stop piracy, that one wonders if intellectual property law will soon resemble those warnings you see in deserts or mountains: proceed at your own risk. Publish at your own risk.

It looks like technology has come to the point where we have to revolutionize intellectual property law whether we want to or not. Either shift the paradigm, or watch the paradigm become useless.

Now that I think about it, maybe we have an unspoken contempt for intellectual property law. I’ve met a few people in the education field who were sincerely angry that someone might sell academic materials instead of freely giving them away.

I loved the day of protest, especially since I could still read Wikipedia via smartphone. In keeping with my the topics of my last few posts, I would point out that the reaction to SOPA was very Hayekean– “spontaneous order,” if you will.

But perhaps I’m conflating piracy with theft and/or plagiarism. I’ll have to finish the book, won’t I?

By the way, if you remember any part of this in your brain, I’m going to sue you.

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I think there’s a much simpler way to explain the NFL’s playoff rule: it’s sudden-death, except that the game cannot end on a field goal on the first possession of OT.

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An anonymous reader asks, “What are your thoughts on Ron Pauls rise in fame and in the polls. Is he the real deal? Or just another Ross Perot?”

Ron Paul has had an unusual effect on the political scene. Some pundit (I forget which one) pointed out that no other major party candidate in recent memory has gotten as many people reading as Ron Paul has. And I don’t mean the typical fluff that your typical presidential candidate puts out, I mean works of political philosophy and economics. (Unfortunately for him, some folks are also reading his old newsletters, which feature some questionable material.)

I’m not sure what, exactly, you mean by “the real deal.” Is Ron Paul sincere? Far more so than any other major party candidate of the last two presidential election cycles, with the possible exception of Elizabeth Kucinich’s husband. His consistency on the issues puts other politicians to shame, if such creatures were capable of such a condition. Does he have a shot at winning? Yes, but it’s remote. Is he going to win the Republican nomination? Nope.

Is he just another Ross Perot? Yes and no. Yes, in the sense that both are Texans who aren’t going to be President, they both focus heavily on the national debt, and they share initials. But the dissimilarities are legion. Paul is far more ideological than Perot. Paul has consistent, principled stances on a broad array of issues while nobody can remember what Perot talked about aside from the debt. Also, I think (I can’t prove it) that Perot ran due to spite towards George H. W. Bush more than anything else, while Paul is running based on genuine conviction. Furthermore, Paul’s not going to run as a third party candidate.

I remember when Perot was running and everyone was complaining about a debt of around $4 trillion. Good times.

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