Fight, or Roll Over?

[Perry E. Metzger]

"Robert A. Hayden" writes:
> On Thu, 13 Jul 1995, Douglas Barnes wrote:
> 
> > Since the Anti-Electronic Racketeering Act of 1995 might as well
> > be called the "Anti-Cypherpunk Act of 1995", I'm surprised to see
> > Tim throw in the towel already, when the bill hasn't even made it
> > through committee yet.
> 
> I don't think Tim threw in the towell on this bill, but has come to 
> realize that the overall war on privacy cannot be won by concentrating on 
> the individual battles.

Thats true. However, I think that one strategic move would be to get a
PR firm involved that is capable of severly embarassing any politico
who puts his name any of these proposals. After two or three of those
they start getting gunshy.

Folks, this isn't trivial. It isn't an easy thing to do by any
means. However, it is far from impossible.

> We've ALL got to take a deep breath and come up with a different
> plan of attack; a plan that the TLAs and spooks will be unable to
> defend against.

There is no such plan. They can't control the technology in the long
run but they can throw us all in jail in the short run. I have
substantial personal interest in keeping this stuff legal, and I don't
give a flying fig *who* sponsors legislation.

Do you think the agricultural industry lies down every time that
congress proposes to cut subsidies? Do you think that the gun lobby
lies down and plays dead? They get a bad bill proposed virtually every
week. Do you think the health care industry would have been correct to
say "oh, Hillary has us bushwacked -- this is a major
initiative. Guess we'd better give up."

Anyone who is saying that it is impossible to fight the legislative
battles hasn't been thinking. It takes millions of dollars,  but there
is a lot of money out there to be had in my opinion.

Perry