I don't mean for this to come off like a vendetta, but with all of the hype regarding Dr. Ron Paul, I had to share with you the email that I got today at work. If it looks like spam, and it feels like spam, and I don't know the sender, you'd better believe that I consider it to be spam. Considering all of the promises in this email, you certainly have to question the motivation of the sender. More importantly, if elected, will Dr. Ron give me a good deal on Viagra, a new version of Adobe, and help me obtain the $1.5 billion dollars that is left in a Nigerian estate on behalf of a dying uncle?

This is the dark side of a "grass-roots" campaign. Typically, all of the advertising came from, and was controlled by, the campaign itself. Now that we all have an equal ability in the new media revolution to make comparable communications with voters, occasionally some of the soldiers go rogue with disasterous results.

A "grass-roots" army is only as good as its general, and I was surprised that Dr. Paul made no effort on the Daily Source Code the other day to say, "hey, new media come work with us, and let us help you refine our message." To me, it seemed that while he was happy with the internet support, he came off like a bemused patriarch that still had no clue of the potential power that he had in crafting his message in a new and different way. Maybe in 2012 someone will figure it out.

By the way, if this email was really from the Dr. Paul campaign, if you are going to directly solicit my vote....at least get my name right.

-----Original Message-----
From: jethro justin [mailto:javed@e-business-associates.com]
Sent: Friday, October 26, 2007 8:50 PM
To: Todd
Subject: Who Is Ron Paul?

Hello Scott,

Ron Paul is for the people, unless you want your children to have human
implant RFID chips, a National ID card and
create a North American Union and see an economic collapse far worse
than the great depression. Vote for Ron Paul he
speaks the truth and the media and government is afraid of him go to
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ron+paul and you will see
his large base. Get motivated America, don't
believe the lies of the media he has also WON the GOP Debate On Sunday!
Go Ron Paul! Value Freedom instead of corporate
lies and corruption. Bypass this media blackout they are doing to Ron
Paul, tell your family and friends and get
involved in a local group at meetup.com make your voice heard! He will
end the War In Iraq immediately, He will
eliminate the IRS and wasteful government spending, and eliminate the
Federal Reserve and restore power to the people
and the only person not a member on the CFR. Can any other runner make
these claims?

**** STOP THE WAR & Corporate Corruption****

He has NEVER voted:
* to raise taxes
* for an unbalanced budget
* to raise congressional pay
* for a federal restriction on gun ownership
* to increase the power of the executive branch

He HAS voted:
* against the Iraq war
* against the inappropriately named USA PATRIOT act
* against regulating the internet
* against the Military Commissions Act

He will eliminate the IRS, Wasteful Government Spending & Stop The Iraq
War Immediately!

Most importantly, he voted NO on anything in Congress that is not
allowed by the Constitution.

Google: Ron Paul  Today! Join The Revolution!

I'd like to be the first to congratulate Adam Curry for scoring an interview with Texas Republican Presidential Candidate, Ron Paul, on the Daily Source Code next Wednesday. Dr. Paul is certainly an interesting candidate, and I find his candidacy appealing on so many levels. At the very least, I appreciate his pushing the debate forward, and engaging the problems of this country on an intellectual level, rather than bombast and rhetoric. However, he is not getting my vote.

Let me reveal my "bona-fides". I was a former President of the Young Republicans, and I have run for office as a registered Democrat. As an attorney, I have represented the State of New Jersey in claims seeking compensation for injuries, and I now work for a personal injury Firm, and represent injured workers. I certainly have been on both sides of a lot of different issues, and been to cocktail parties on both sides.

While I agree with Dr. Paul on a great number of issues, I disagree with him on a big one, and unfortunately, this one is a deal breaker for me. This past Summer, he introduced H.R. 3342, the "Freedom from Unnecessary Litigation Act." Under this proposed law, which was not co-sponsored by any other Republican or Democrat, you would be entitled to a tax credit if you purchase "Negative Outcome Insurance." What I make of it is, that if you were planning to go in for surgery, and purchased an additional policy, at your cost, you could deduct this amount from your taxes. Moreover, the bill provides that a medical malpractice award provided in arbitration are not subject to taxation as gross income.

Let me be blunt: this bill stinks. I doubt that this is really about "Unnecessary Litigation", and the bill needs to be renamed the "Insurance Industry Bailout Act", as it benefits the insurance industry far more than it would ever benefit you and I.

Insurance is the one product that you are going to pay for, that nobody, mostly the insurance industry, is ever going to want you to need. In fact, its a form of gambling. The insurance company is very happy to collect your premium, and the odds are in their favor that you will never need their help. It is a business, and should never be considered to be your entitlement or charity.

I agree that there is a medical malpractice crisis in this country. I also agree that good doctors are being forced to pay for bad doctors. However, this is a problem with the insurance industry, and not a problem with the Court system. The insurance industry is going to have to adapt and change and reevaluate how doctors are insured, and if a bad doctor can not afford insurance, then perhaps they should not be practicing. Here is the most simple thing for doctors: don't commit malpractice.

In fact, and I can not stress this enough, there are already numerous, numerous good laws on the books that hold attorneys to a very high standard before bringing a medical malpractice claim. To be quite honest, I think some of these requirements set the bar way too high and are actually harming already hurt people even more by making it nearly impossible to find a lawyer with the resources available to take their claim. That's just my opinion.

However, this bill is just "piling on". It is nearly cliche to continue to blame the trial lawyers. The first part of the bill provides you a tax break for purchasing a new insurance policy. Clearly, this benefits the insurance industry in that they are going to get to promote a whole new product, that for the most part they will never have to pay out on. Most doctors in this country are very, very good. Perhaps the idea is that this new revenue will offset the amounts that they have to pay out in claims, allowing them to still make a profit.

The second part of the bill, attempts to encourage people to arbitrate their claims, and holds the arbitration awards exempt from income tax. While I am not an accountant, I was under the impression that personal injury awards are already exempt, but I will leave this to brighter minds. However, what is not stated here, is that there is an unwritten tradeoff is that for the perception that an arbitration would be faster, you submit to the judgment of the arbitrator - who in most situations sets a cap for awards. This, too, only benefits the insurance company far more than it does a severely injured patient.

For a strict Constitutionalist like Dr. Paul, I am surprised. First, this is a back-handed critique of the States' ability to handle medical malpractice claims quickly. These claims, which, as stated, are already very, very difficult to bring, are often hotly contested and require sophisticated medical testimony. Ultimately, this may be a "local" issue rather than one for the Federal government, who certainly has other issues on their plate. Second, our Founding Parents truly believed in the sanctity and wisdom of the jury system. I do, too. Anything that encourages straying from this path makes me very, very nervous.

In 2005, my beautiful and talented cousin, Sheena Ayers, passed away as a result of medical malpractice after a courageous battle with Cystic Fibrosis. From a legal standpoint, medical malpractice is not a bad result, but a gross deviation of care from the accepted standard of care established by the common practices of other doctors. Sheena knew the potential risks going into her surgery. She never expected one of these risks to be her doctor.

If an insurance company chooses to insure a doctor who has so severely deviated from the norm, then they should not receive any sort of "bailout" from the Federal Government, and that is what this bill hopes to accomplish.

I like Dr. Paul a great deal, but with this bill, he has completely missed the point, and reminds me of my last experience with a Texas Republican.

Thank you for joining me on such occasion. I thought this wasn't going to be a big deal, but at the end of the day, Show 100 became a reaffirmation of my love for this thing we do. Kudos to you if you catch the Jersey Todd trivia. Featuring the music of:

1. The Wylde Bunch
2. Stefanie Seskin
3. Danko Jones
4. Beth Hirsch
5. Geoff Smith

Featuring Marco Pesci

Listen to the show here

For our hundredth show, and in celebration of Halloween, and all of those Podcamps going on this time of year, its time for another Jersey Todd Ghost Story. Settle into your sleeping bags. Maybe cook up one more of those s’mores thingies. Mr. Curry, one more puff before bed. Mr. Nemcoff, hands on top of the covers. Here we go.

It was a dark and stormy night. No wait, that’s too cliché. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Eh, never really understood that one. Being a small-town Midwest girl, I had no idea that an all girl nursing school located near a truck stop would be such an adventure – oh wait, that’s another project that I’m working on. Let’s just start by telling you about the people.

Jammie Thomas is a 30-year old, single mother from Duluth, Minnesota. She is a hard working mom of two children – ages 11 and 13 years old, and when she gets tired and bored, after the end of a long day, she turns to that one source of entertainment that you and I take for granted – her personal computer. Except, this past year, that personal computer has become her own peripheral of horrors, a silicon pariah, a virtual blood-sucking, money grabbing money hole.

Like so many others, she was accused by those ghouls at the Recording Industry Association of America – the RIAA – of hosting 1,702 songs on Kazaa. Actually, lets be more specific, over the last few years, the RIAA has sued over 26,000 people. But in Ms. Thomas’ case, the RIAA wanted to get her for over 1.2 million dollars. I know Boo! Scary.

Most people take the dive. Most people run and hide like they just saw a ghost, but not Jammie Thomas. No Ms. Thomas didn’t just settle give the RIAA $4,000 of her money and hope that they go away, no she did what every brave American should do. She hired a lawyer, and then when negotiations broke down, she did what every brave American should do, she took her case to trial.

However, here’s the problem. She didn’t really have a very good case. She was accused of hosting a mere 1700 files on Kazaa. I really believe that her lawyer treated it like a simple criminal matter, which does indeed make sense because she is being accused of stealing. His main argument was in the great tradition of Matlock in that he said, well nobody saw you upload the tracks, which really doesn’t do much when the RIAA brings experts to Court to say that the music was uploaded from her internet address and from her password. But, you know, the thrust of the "wasn’t me" argument always has legs in criminal court. In fact, I represented a kid in Chester, Pennsylvania about ten-times who apparently was always at the bus-stop, or his aunt’s house, and had ten cousins that looked just like him.

The problem is that this was not a criminal case, and the RIAA did not have to prove their claims beyond a reasonable doubt, they just had to do so by a preponderance of the evidence, and like I’ve said so many times on this program, all you have to do to show a "preponderance of the evidence" is to show that it is more likely than not that you did something wrong, and in the case of Ms. Thomas her lawyer was kidding themselves allowing this client to take this case to trial. Sure, she had a defense, but when the risks outweighed the rewards, even I would have told her to pony up the four grand and bail out of the situation as quick as humanly possible.

So, she decided to do her best Doyle Brunson, and pushed her chips all in, and took her case to trial. In fact, Ms. Thomas’ case just went to the jury this week, and again showing the wisdom of a State that elected a professional wrestler to Governor, this Minnesota jury found Jammie guilty of copyright infringement. But you want to talk about going flop on the river card, Ms. Thomas went bust for $222,000. What this means, in my Poker to English dictionary is she’s now on the hook for a huge problemo.

So its come to this, has it RIAA. Its come to getting irrational judgments against single mothers. Its come to beating up grandmothers and the infirm. For what? For who? This isn’t about protecting the artists. Copyright law has far exceeded any kind of protection that the artists require. This is essentially the same as if your kid gave a copy of your CD to a neighbor, and you ended up losing your house. It just doesn’t make any sense any more. Oh, and just so you know, from the lawyer’s perspective, he probably counts this as a win – because he got it down from 1700 songs to 24. That’s pretty good, and in a criminal case the guy would be a genius. But in a civil case, where its mandatory fees of $9,250 per song – 24 songs add up very, very quickly.

You want to take one quote from this show, and print it out of context. You want to take one quote and put it up there in boldface let me make it easier for you. When I first started hanging around the Courts, the first Judge that I worked for was 80-years old and couldn’t tell the difference between the power-button on a computer and a candy-button in a trick-or-treat bag. The law catches up to society, and right now the enforcement of copyright has caught up to 1992.

But what they don’t get. What the RIAA doesn’t get is that the war is over. Its over, and I’m not talking about podcasts, or mp3 blogs, or Kazaa, or any of the millions of ways that you can get your music before you even get to itunes. No I’m talking about the public perception of the value of music. When you’re too cheap to buy a girl you like some flowers, you make her a mix-tape. When you’re in a car with someone you have nothing in common with, you turn on the radio with a hope that it will fill the dead space between you. Music is like air, its like water.

Lets be even more honest with ourselves. We don’t by music for the music. We buy it for a lot of reasons. I buy music because I like the personality of the artist. I buy it because I have a connection to the band. I buy them. I buy the story. I buy music when it makes me want to feel something. I buy it because the first time I heard it the song made me feel cool or tough or strong or in love, and I want that feeling again and again. I buy music for the memories. Music is a souvenir of a time and a place. What kind of value does that have? What should the artist get, and let me be clear, I make a huge difference between a musician and an artist. Any kid in Ms. Silverberg’s 8th grade music class is a musician – they may be a crappy one – but they are a musician, but an artist is someone that can create a place, and a time, in between my ears and that certainly deserves compensation.Art is the only place that we actually can try to put a formula on emotion. Sure, I’ll pay 99 cents when I like a track, but do I get 50 cents back when it starts getting on my nerves. I’m talking to you cast of High School Musical. This is something that can’t be decided by a simple podcaster on a simple show that only 10,000 people download on a weekly basis. Eh, just checking to see if you’re still listening. But what I can do is give you some knowledge. I can bust some tasty tasty science on your mad cerebellum. So, let me throw you something that I’m sure Ms. Thomas’ lawyer didn’t talk about in his closing argument, and I really think that its something that should be strongly encouraged in every case involving the RIAA. Jury Nullification. The jury system in this country was founded upon the idea that a panel of citizens, sitting for a short time, was incorruptible. My main man, DJ Tommy Tom Thomas Jefferson said "I consider trial by jury as the only anchor yet imagined by man by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution." Jury nullification is the idea where a jury can listen to the Judge’s instructions, their summation of the law, and say nyyyyah, we’re not going for it, and I’m not at all advocating that jury nullification be used in every case. We have laws for a reason, and although people may like or dislike the results in individual cases, jury nullification if abused could really upset the apple cart of the judiciary and legislative branch. But what if the judiciary and legislature are already lost on an issue? It has been said that the jury is the last line of defense against a tyriannical government. What do we have when we deal with the RIAA and their stranglehold over copyright law? The copyright code is 200 pages, it is incomprehensible, and the RIAA has full time lobbyists who’s main job is to increase the strength of the copyright code.   Any lawyer worth their salt had better start thinking about it if ever involved with a lawsuit by the RIAA, and jury nullification is a very, very touchy subject for trial judges.

But in any case where the power of sentencing, or determining of damages, has already been abrogated by statute, I truly believe that jury nullification – where the jury can determine what makes sense to punish someone like Jammie Thomas, makes absolute sense. And at the end of the day, boys and girls, the RIAA is scary. Its like this big ghost like thing that hovers over all of our heads. But remember when you were a little kid and you finally got the courage to look under the bed, and you didn’t see a ghost? Remember, when you looked in the closet, and finally saw that there really wasn’t a monster. It was about the control, and maybe now is the time that some of our juries start looking at monsters like the RIAA and saying we’re not scared of you.

Happy Halloween everyone.

Thanks to Brian from Audio Attitude. Could you find a picture next time that doesn't look like I've been dealing with screaming babies all night. Oh wait, there aren't any lately...