In his radio broadcast of Wednesday, June 18, Rush Limbaugh delivered a dire warning\u2026 albeit a warning that few listeners will be able to relate to in their private lives.\u00a0 He reported on the decision by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to attack the property rights of the Washington Redskins, revoking their trademark rights to the Redskins name and logo.\u00a0 Rush reminded his listeners that, on January 9 of this year, he predicted that \u201cthe way the feds are going to \u2018get the Redskins\u2019 is (through) the federal trademark office.\u201d<\/p>\n
He asked his listeners to imagine the federal government eliminating their private-property rights because of the interpretation of political correctness by a \u201cvery tiny minority\u201d of people, ostensibly because they are \u201coffended by something that you own\u2026\u201d\u00a0 He went on to say that they do this \u201cbecause of political correctness, because they\u2019re liberals, because they\u2019re statists and authoritarians\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
He concluded by saying, \u201cWhat happened to the Redskins is neither the first nor the last assault on private-property rights that citizens can expect to witness.\u201d\u00a0 He cautioned, \u201cCheer if you want, but scoffers need to remember that no one is safe when the protections of a constitutional republic are stripped away.\u201d<\/p>\n
There is no doubt that the U.S. patent and trademark system has been the \u201cengine\u201d of our economy since the day it was written into the U.S. Constitution in 1787.\u00a0 No other nation on Earth has a patent and trademark system like ours, a system that has the potential of creating great personal wealth for anyone who knows how to \u201cbuild a better mousetrap.\u201d\u00a0 Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, two of the most innovative minds among our Founding Fathers, were both prolific inventors, but neither of them could possibly have imagined the scope of what they set in motion.<\/p>\n
However, having created an economy and a standard of living far beyond what is available anywhere else in the world, particularly in nations of the Third World, it was to be expected that our patent and copyright system would one day come under attack by foreign interests.<\/p>\n
In April 1997, I was minding my own business at my remote hideaway amid the hills and lakes of eastern Oklahoma when I received a telephone call from Washington.\u00a0 I was being recruited as part of a three-man team to take on a very important project.\u00a0 Our job was to kill Senate Bill 507, the Omnibus Patent Reform Act of 1997, and H.400, the House version of the bill.<\/p>\n
But first, a bit of history.\u00a0 In 1996, the Clinton administration agreed to give the People\u2019s Republic of China a complete set of magnetic tapes from the U.S. Patent Office computers, containing every iota of U.S. technology registered with the patent office in the previous 160 years.\u00a0 For those who have wondered what the Chinese received in exchange for the millions of dollars they poured into the Clinton-Gore reelection campaign in 1996, we finally had an answer.\u00a0 However, when the editor of an internal Commerce Department newsletter unwittingly exposed the scheme all hell broke loose and the offer was withdrawn.\u00a0 It was then that Bill Clinton and Al Gore, at the behest of the Japanese and the Chinese, caused legislation to be introduced in the Congress that would have literally decimated the U.S. patent system.<\/p>\n
When the legislation was described to me I thought it must be some terrible joke.\u00a0 No American president could possibly think it was a good idea\u2026 unless, of course, he owed a huge debt of gratitude to the Chinese and he was more concerned about that than he was about the economic security of the American people.\u00a0 The legislation we were hired to defeat would have damaged or destroy the U.S. patent system, to the benefit of our foreign trading partners.<\/p>\n
We had a difficult task ahead of us.\u00a0 On our first day in Washington the House of Representatives passed its version of the bill, H.400, on a voice vote.\u00a0 Not a single member of the House called for a recorded vote.\u00a0 They voted to destroy one of the most important core functions of the federal government, and they did it on a voice<\/i> vote\u2026 <\/i>without a single public hearing.<\/p>\n
The Clinton legislation proposed that the Department of Commerce relinquish its control over the U.S. Patent Office, and that the patent office would become a new government corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of the federal government.\u00a0 They further proposed that the patent office be controlled by an advisory board comprised of six individuals drawn from the private sector\u2026 many, if not all, with vested interests in patent office decisions.<\/p>\n
They proposed that the patent office be authorized to accept gifts of cash, or anything else of value, without limit, from any and all sources, including individuals, corporations, foreign businessmen, and foreign governments.\u00a0 There was not even a prohibition against contributions from individuals and corporations with patents pending.<\/p>\n
They proposed that the patent office be authorized to borrow money and to create debt, without congressional approval, and to retire debt by increasing patent fees\u2026 in effect, giving the patent office the power to levy taxes.\u00a0 They simply ignored the fact that, under provisions of the U.S. Constitution, only the Congress has the power to tax.<\/p>\n
In order to attract the support of America\u2019s largest multinational corporations, the authors of the bill included two provisions that would allow corporations, foreign and domestic, as well as foreign governments, to literally steal intellectual properties without the necessity of paying royalties.\u00a0 First, they proposed that the Patent Office be required to make public all technical details of every new patent application just eighteen months after the inventor filed for a patent\u2026 on average, some two and one-half years before the inventor would receive patent protection\u2026 with the entire world looking on.<\/p>\n
U.S. patent law has always required that all technical details of every patent application be held in strictest confidence by the patent office until the inventor received patent protection.\u00a0 In effect, there would no longer be patent protection for anyone except those with deep enough pockets to defend themselves in multi-million dollar court challenges.<\/p>\n
Finally, they proposed the establishment of a system of \u201cpatent reexaminations\u201d in which any person or corporation, for a $2,000 filing fee, could cause any existing patent to be reexamined by the patent office.\u00a0 Under provisions of H.400 and S.507, the inventor would be prohibited from using, licensing, or exploiting his or her patented technology in any way while the patent was under reexamination.\u00a0 And while the reexamination process could take years to complete, the clock would continue to run on the inventor\u2019s seventeen-year patent term.<\/p>\n
Of course, if the inventor were able to successfully defend his patent, those who wished to steal his technology would have others standing in line to file for additional reexaminations.\u00a0 Rather than face personal bankruptcy through the legal costs of endless reexaminations, most inventors would gladly sell their rights to their patents for pennies on the dollar.<\/p>\n
If ever there was an outright invitation to corruption, the Clinton-Gore Omnibus Patent Reform Act of 1997 was it.\u00a0 There was nothing in it for the American people, but when we looked to see who was supporting the bills we could understand their motivation.\u00a0 We found ourselves arrayed against the president and vice president of the United States, the People\u2019s Republic of China, the Japanese government, the Indonesian Lippo Group, and more than eighty U.S. multinational corporations, including, General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, General Electric, IBM, Microsoft, Intel, Motorola, Coca-Cola, and dozens more.<\/p>\n
We were up against the most powerful coalition of political and moneyed interests on Earth, and the bill they were supporting was potentially more damaging to our country than if we\u2019d lost World War II to the Germans and Japanese, or if we\u2019d lost the Cold War to the Soviets, and it was all done at the behest of a leftist administration in the White House\u2026 much like the Obama administration\u2019s decision to revoke the Washington Redskins\u2019 right to use their name and logo.<\/p>\n
With a bit of skillful maneuvering behind the scenes, we were able to defeat S.507 in the U.S. Senate.\u00a0 However, I will never forget the day we found ourselves going from senate office to senate office, following close on the heels of a small group of corporate CEOs, led by none other than Microsoft\u2019s Bill Gates, undoing any damage they might have done.\u00a0 As we visited with one western senator he shook his head, and said, \u201cYou know, I have a big problem with a guy who makes $13 million a day coming in here \u2018whining\u2019 about how tough things are for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
But liberals never give up.\u00a0 The problems confronted by the Washington Redskins are only more proof that if at first they don\u2019t succeed, liberals will try and try again.\u00a0 As German theologian Martin Niem\u0151ller said, \u201cIn Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn\u2019t speak up because I wasn\u2019t a Communist.\u00a0 Then they came for the Jews, and I didn\u2019t speak up because I wasn\u2019t a Jew.\u00a0 Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn\u2019t speak up because I wasn\u2019t a trade unionist.\u00a0 Then they came for the Catholics<\/a>, and I didn\u2019t speak up because I was a Protestant<\/a>.\u00a0 Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up.\u201d<\/p>\n Today they came after the Washington Redskins; who will it be tomorrow?\u00a0 In November, the voters must begin to send the message that, like crime, political correctness does not pay.\u00a0 There can be no better way to accomplish that end than by voting against every Democrat on the ballot.\u00a0 It is they who are the principal purveyors and the principal beneficiaries of political correctness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In his radio broadcast of Wednesday, June 18, Rush Limbaugh delivered a dire warning\u2026 albeit a warning that few listeners will be able to relate to in their private lives.\u00a0 He reported on the decision by the U.S. Patent and … Continue reading