No Patent reform for US - Cnet writer thinks that's great

[greggh]

http://www.cnet.com/8301-13555_1-994124 ... 47-1_3-0-5

After years of heated debate and lobbying, the Patent Reform Act of 2007, which passed in the U.S. House of Representatives and was scheduled for a Senate vote this session, has been taken off the Senate's calendar. It can be revived, but its momentum has effectively fizzled.

Apparently, the Senate has better things to do with its time.

At this point, I don't wish to rehash the issues of, or my viewpoint on, the Patent Reform Act. Besides, as I've said, both sides in the debate were after only their own self-interests. Such is life in a capitalist society. (I think that's a good thing.)

That's the beauty of capitalism. It breeds pure, unadulterated self-interest and greed. And while that sounds really nasty, it isn't. It's one of the characteristics that made our nation the most powerful on Earth.

What's all that got to do with patent reform? Not a thing. And that's the point.

Just because patents have been a part of the system of the U.S. government for a long time doesn't mean that patents are at all responsible for the U.S. being a great country. We'd be a better country without them, or at the very least reforming them. This writer is the definition of logical fallacy.

[Vogateer]

He didn't say that patents made the U.S. great, he said that self-interest made the U.S. great. I'm guessing he means that people are self-interested by nature, and that building a system that expects humans to be supremely self-interested is better than trying to fight a natural instinct. It's hard to say, that article doesn't say much except that there are interesting alliances in the debate.

The ideas he states are debatable, of course, but he didn't say anything about patents making the U.S. great.