Guest Post by Stilton Jarlsberg
The TPP (which allegedly stands for Trans-Pacific Partnership even though we’re more familiar with those first two letters having a different and more accurate association) is the bizarre, mostly-secret trade agreement which our current anti-capitalist president is ramming through. It’s long, complex, and, like Obamacare, deliberately written to be misunderstood – so we just want to focus on one seemingly teeny-tiny element which was recently changed (and which the Obama administration is no doubt hoping will fly under the radar).
You can read all about it here, but in a nutshell the TPP will allegedly extend “copyright protection” for things like online content by allowing the government to bring charges against anyone suspected of copyright infringement even if the “copying” (like a simple link to a news story) does no harm to the copyright owner and, indeed, may even be encouraged by the copyright owner.
In other words, Hope n’ Change could be shut down for linking to the dry story about the TPP above, let alone linking to stories about more sensitive issues like Hillary’s criminal wrongdoing or how “Bathhouse Barry” got his nickname. And if you share one of our cartoons, even though we explicitly encourage you to do so, the government could come and get YOU, too. A very tidy way to curtail bothersome political speech, don’t you think?
Despite vagueness in many other areas, the TPP is quite clear about what the government can do to you if it finds you in potential (or even imaginary) violation of their new copyright standards:
Continue reading “TPP WILL DESTROY FREE SPEECH”
