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| Trade |
2/27. President Bush gave an address
to a joint session of the House and Senate on his proposed
budget and tax cuts. He also asked the Congress to grant him fast
track trade negotiating authority. "Each of the
previous five presidents has had the ability to negotiate
far-reaching trade agreements. Tonight, I ask you to give me
the strong hand of presidential trade promotion authority and
to do so quickly." He did not address technology related
issues.
2/22. Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman gave a speech
in Vienna, Virginia, in which she said that "We must pass
presidential trade negotiating authority so that we can enter
into new market-opening agreements, including the Free Trade
Area of the Americas and a new WTO agreement. The lack of this
authority has undermined America's fundamental ability to lead
global market-opening efforts. We must also advance an
ambitious agenda for the next round of global trade
talks."
2/27. The Senate
Finance Committee held a hearing on trade policy. Chairman
Chuck Grassley
(R-IA) said in his opening
statement that "Thanks to the distortions fostered by
the opponents of free trade, the increasingly integrated world
economy is often seen as nothing more than a source of global
inequality and exploitation. ... It's time to set the record
straight. That's what today's hearing is about." See
also, prepared statement of witnesses: David Aaron
(former Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade), William
Daley (Former Secretary of Commerce), Carla Hills
(former USTR), Robert
Hormats (Vice Chairman, Goldman Sachs).
2/27. Sen. Grassley also advocated giving the President fast
track trade negotiating authority. "However, the one
thing we must not do is employ trade sanctions to enforce
labor and environmental provisions in trade agreements. This
would be a prescription for disaster in terms of rebuilding an
international consensus for trade liberalization. ... I will
strongly oppose any legislation that directly or indirectly
involves the use of trade sanctions to enforce such provisions
in trade agreements. I will fight such legislation if it is
brought before this Committee, and I will work hard to defeat
it." |
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| Racicot Joins RIAA |
| 2/27. The Recording Industry
Association of America (RIAA) announced that former
Montana Governor Marc Racicot (R) will join the RIAA as
outside counsel. See, RIAA release.
He is currently a partner in the Washington DC office of the
law firm of Bracewell
& Patterson. He was Attorney General of Montana before
being elected governor in 1992. He was re-elected in 1996 with
79% of the vote. He will bolster the RIAA's ability to lobby
the Congress and President on intellectual property issues
affecting the music recording industry. He was a very early
supporter of President Bush's candidacy for President. His
fellow Montanans hold key posts in the Senate. Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT)
is Chairman of the Communications Subcommittee. Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) is
Ranking Democrat on the Finance Committee. |
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| New Documents |
Bush:
address
to Congress re budget, 9/27 (HTML, GOP).
Markey:
amendment
to bankruptcy reform bill re privacy for electronic records,
2/27 (HTML, TLJ).
USCA:
transcript
of day two of oral argument in U.S. v. Microsoft, 2/27 (HTML,
MSFT).
Coble:
speech
re intellectual property agenda for the 107th Congress, 2/16
(HTML, TLJ).
Myrick:
IPO letter
to Commerce Sec. Evans re diversion of USPTO fees, 2/23 (HTML,
IPO).
DOJ:
Cert
Petition of the DOJ in Ashcroft v. ACLU, the COPA case
(HTML, DOJ).
Veneman:
speech re trade policy, 2/22 (HTML, DOS).
Mink:
HR
726, a bill to ban gun sales on the Internet, 2/26 (HTML,
LOC). |
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| USPTO Fees |
| 2/27. For years some of the user fees paid to the USPTO
have been diverted to subsidize other government programs.
Proponents of ending this diversion waged an effort, in
advance of the President's budget address, to end this
diversion. On Feb. 16 Rep.
Howard Coble (R-NC), Chairman of the House Courts,
Internet and Intellectual Property Subcommittee (CIIP), gave a
speech
in which he said that "Since 1992 through this year, the
President and Congress have taken more than $650 million in
patent fees ... I am elevating the end of the fee diversion to
my number one patent and trademark priority." On Feb. 26,
Rep. John Conyers
(D-MI), Ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary
Committee, and Rep.
Howard Berman (D-CA), Ranking Democrat on CIIP, sent a
letter to President Bush urging him to allow the USPTO to
"devote all of its user fees to modernizing and
professionalizing its office." On Feb. 23 Ron Myrick,
President of the Intellectual
Property Owners Association (IPO), wrote a letter
to Commerce Sec. Don Evans in which he argued that the USPTO's
"effectiveness is now in jeopardy. It is faced with an
unprecedented increase in patent and trademark filings."
On Feb. 27 the Information
Technology Association of America (ITAA) sent a letter to
Sec. Evans. See, ITAA
release. |
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| People |
2/27. FCC Chairman
Michael Powell appointed Mary Beth Richards to be
Special Counsel responsible for an FCC reform project. She has
held a number of positions at the FCC, including Deputy Chief
of the Common Carrier Bureau,
Deputy Managing Director of the FCC, Special Counsel to the
Commission for Reinventing Government, Chief of the
Enforcement Divisions of the Common Carrier Bureau and the
former Field Operations Bureau, and Legal Advisor to the Chief
of the Common Carrier Bureau. For more information, contact
David Fiske at 202-418-0513.
2/27. Joseph Lombard will join Archipelago as EVP in its
soon to be opened Washington DC office. Until recently Lombard
was Senior Counsel to former SEC Chairman
Arthur Levitt. See, SEC release.
2/26. BT
announced the appointment of Anne Fletcher as Group
General Counsel. She will take over the role in April. She is
currently Director of Regulatory Compliance with BT. She will
replace Alan Whitfield, who is joining the accountancy
firm KPMG. See, BT
release. |
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| COPA Cert Petition |
| 2/27. The Department of
Justice published in its web site a copy of its Petition
for Writ of Certiorari filed with the U.S. Supreme Court
earlier this month in the legal proceeding challenging the
constitutionality of the Child Online
Protection Act (COPA). This proceeding is now
titled Ashcroft v. ACLU. The COPA Act, which was passed at the
end of the 105th Congress in late 1998, makes it unlawful to
make any communication for commercial purposes by means of the
World Wide Web that is available to minors and that includes
material that is "harmful to minors," unless good
faith efforts are made to prevent children from obtaining
access to such material. The U.S. Court of Appeals
(3rdCir) issued its opinion
on June 22, 2000, upholding the U.S. District Court's order
enjoining enforcement of the Act. |
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| More News |
2/26. Rep. Patsy Mink
(D-HI) introduced HR
726, a bill that would amend the criminal code to provide
that "It shall be unlawful for any person to use the
Internet to obtain or dispose of, or offer to obtain or
dispose of a firearm." The bill has been referred to the House Judiciary
Committee.
2/27. The ICANN
published in its web site a request
for comments on internationalized domain names -- that is,
the use of non-Roman characters, such as Chinese, Japanese,
Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit, and Cyrillic characters.
2/27. FCC Commissioner Harold Furchtgott-Roth addressed the
Washington DC Bar Association and the Federal Communications Bar
Association on "Ex Parte Contacts: How Can Agencies
Achieve Neutrality and Transparency?"
2/27. The FCC's Network
Reliability and Interoperability Council held a meeting.
See, agenda.
2/22. The U.S. Attorney's Office (CDCal)
announced that Adrian Herr plead guilty one count of criminal
copyright infringement for copying and selling over the
Internet a variety of computer software products, including
Microsoft Windows 98, Windows 2000, Office 2000 and Publisher
2000. See, release. |
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| Quote of the Day |
"... thanks to a well-funded, well-organized anti-free
trade campaign, the 50-year, American-led effort to enhance
global prosperity and peace through reducing barriers to trade
is now in jeopardy."
Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA), statement
at Senate Finance Committee hearing on trade, Feb. 27. |
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| Bankruptcy Privacy |
2/27. On Thursday, March 1, the House will likely debate and
vote on HR
333, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer
Protection Act of 2001, sponsored by Rep. George Gekas
(R-PA). The Judiciary
Committee passed the bill on Feb. 14 by a vote of 19-8. On
Wednesday, Feb. 28, the Rules
Committee will meet to adopt a rule for consideration of
the bill. Numerous amendments have been submitted to the Rules
Committee, including several pertaining to privacy.
2/27. Rep. Ed Markey
(D-MA) sent an amendment
to the Rules Committee that would add privacy protections
afforded to electronic bankruptcy records by requiring
that personal and financial information divulged in a
bankruptcy proceeding be disclosed only to individuals and
entities that have legitimate interests in the case. It
provides that the "clerk of the bankruptcy court ... may
provide electronic access to a paper filed in a case",
but that the clerk "may not provide electronic access (A)
to the debtor’s social security number, date of birth,
mother's maiden name, telephone number, or account numbers
(including bank account and credit card account numbers); (B)
to any of the single line items in the debtor’s schedule of
assets or statement of income and expenditures; or (C) to any
personal, medical, or financial information regarding the
debtor or a relative of the debtor." However, the
amendment continues that the clerk may provide electronic
access to "a party in interest ... an entity that
requires any such information to determine whether it is a
party in interest ... the trustee ... the United States
trustee; or ... a governmental unit that requires any such
information for a bona fide law enforcement purpose".
2/27. Rep. Mark
Green (R-WI) sent an amendment to the Rules Committee that
would remove the names of children from bankruptcy filings in
order to protect their identity from those who prey on
children. See, summary
of amendments.
2/27. The Senate
Judiciary Committee has scheduled a business meeting for
Feb. 28 at 9:30 AM to resume markup of its version of the
bankruptcy reform bill. |
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| Encryption |
| 2/26. The GAO
issued a report
[PDF] titled "Information Security: Advances and
Remaining Challenges to Adoption of Public Key Infrastructure
Technology." The report found that implementation of
Public Key Infrastructrure (PKI) is not commonplace in
government, for several reasons, including interoperability
problems, high monetary cost of implementation, and the lack
of well-defined policies and procedures for ensuring that an
appropriate level of security is maintained. The report was
requested by Rep. Steve
Horn (R-CA), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Government
Efficiency, Financial Management and Intergovernmental
Relations of the House
Committee on Government Reform. |
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| Today |
9:30 AM. FCC Commissioner Harold
Furchtgott-Roth will address the Competitive Carrier
Regulatory Summit 2001. Location: Renaissance Washington
Hotel, Washington DC.
10:00 AM. The House
Commerce Committee will meet in open markup session to
mark up eight bills, including HR 90, the Know Your Caller Act
of 2001, and HR 496, the Independent Telecommunications
Consumer Enhancement Act of 2001. Location: Room 2123, Rayburn
Building.
12:15 PM. The FCBA's
Legislation Committee will host a Brown Bag Luncheon. The
topic will be "Legislative Outlook 2001: House
Perspective." The scheduled speakers are Jessica Wallace
(Rep. Billy Tauzin), Andy Levin (Rep. John Dingell), and Colin
Crowell (Rep. Ed Markey). RSVP to hsymons@mintz.com.
Location: Mintz, Levin, 701 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, Suite 900,
Washington DC.
Deadline to submit comments to the USPTO
regarding the standard for declaring a patent interference. In
its original notice
in the Federal Register of Dec. 20, 2000, the USPTO requested
comments by Jan. 31, 2000. On Feb. 1, 2001, the USPTO
published a second notice
in the Federal Register extending the deadline to Feb. 28,
2001. See, Federal Register, Feb. 1, 2001, Vol. 66, No. 22, at
Page 8571. |
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