The GOP had the opportunity to position themselves on the opposite side from the Democrats. And failed to do so. :-(
I know hearing this upsets HN, and lots of smart people think I'm completely batshit when I say this, but copyright reform is a fringe issue. There are probably more people who vote for the gold standard, or to ban mosques.
Political parties are not full of people who agree with the party on everything. They are full of of people who agree with more of one agenda than another. There are a lot of people who the Republicans could attract. And even if the demographics are not that big for this group, some of the people who they would pull in are exactly who they need to make an answer to Narwhale.
As for how big this issue is likely to be nationally, the Pirate Party in multiple countries regularly polls over 0.5%, and has thrown up several election results where their candidate scored in the 6-9% range. No, that's not enough to win an election. But that is enough to be a significant wedge issue in a tight election. (And US elections are all tight these days.)
It's a subset of the software engineering crowd, the one that works in web space for companies that make money off other peoples' creative work, that sees copyright reform as an important problem. And I think there is a total lack of acknowledgement among this crowd that maybe there are more stakeholders in this issue than just themselves or the big evil music/movie companies. I think there is also a denial of how much certain web companies really depend on other peoples' copyrighted material for their viability (cough Youtube cough).
5 years ago, it was. Today, after the SOPA/PIPA thing, it's much more mainstream. People who 5 years ago thought I was weird for talking about Lessig, today are familiar with Sonny Bono and feel strongly against copyright extensions.
Clearly the GOP is doing some soul searching and this one issue wasn't going to make a gigantic impact, but it could have been one piece of a bigger strategy. As they (potentially) move away from traditionally social conservative issues and start focusing more and more on personal liberty and the free market, this could have been a good contrast to Democrats as part of a broader picture.
The GOP is no more likely to move away from being the party of social conservatism than the Democrats are to move away from being the party of public school teachers.
(Fair warning: I'm a casual browser of libertarian policy positions, but I am most definitely not a libertarian. My libertarian friends would call me a liberal statist.)
In this case it seems like the discussion was stifled because of the big money behind copyright questions.
So regardless it seems a shame that the GOP couldn't use this memo as a starting point for a good debate around policies and where the party stood/stands.
(Source: Against Intellectual Property, by Stephan Kinsella)
Even I, being very dovish on foreign policy, am beginning to question this point when I see for example the current negotiations on the ITU Internet regulations. All this does for me is demonstrate, that values such as free speech and individual liberties are worldwide under attack, and almost entirely depending on America's strenth.
The bigger issue here though, the reason I'll go out on a limb and call copyright reform a fringe issue, is that it's supported by crazy people. For instance, in the "purported reasonableness" camp in the house, you have Darrell Issa, who has generally been a source of supported nods towards copyright reasonableness. Sounds great, right? But Issa is also a crazy hard anti-abortion crusader who has chaired panels in the house on funding for contraception and, recently, to give a new hearing to the vaccine-autism connection.
Single-issue voting is a great way to empower crazy people.
I'd never thought of it that way, but it's a damn good point.
It doesn't.
And holy caricature Batman! You should get out and meet some real-life Republicans. I get that you think they are evil baby-eaters, but they do have many thoughtful people and good ideas that Democrats could learn from.
I personally think the President's power is limited enough, and have enough faith in the judiciary (and overall faith in the bureaucrats who make up the government) that I'd go single-issue on any of a few issues. If there were a Republican or Democrat who wanted to "fix" firearms, IP, debt, entitlements, end foreign occupations and the drug war, and/or fix the tax code, I'd consider working for him for a campaign, donating the max to superpacs, etc., if I thought he could win. I'd be ok if that candidate was against gay rights (since the courts would protect the gains so far, and could extend them), was short or ugly, etc.
It's a bit frustrating to see the term 'believe' used with respect to global warming. Global warming has been described using sound science and 99% of climate scientists agree on this. Using belief suggests that it's a matter of faith like choosing to be catholic.
But the case for the urgency of addressing global warming versus other world problems or the case for addressing global warming through carbon reduction are less well-made.
In 2016, is the Republican Presidential candidate (whoever he or she may be) going to capture a majority of this demographic? Not bloody likely. But all other factors being equal, if that candidate only loses the youth vote by 10 points, it’s that much easier to win the election as a whole.