(As an aside, I was not aware of the level of detail that now goes into adopting a pet.  Considering that every pet my family had come into possession of had been from friends whose own animals had given birth, I naively assumed that an adoption center just wants to get these cats into homes.  In addition to filling out a 3-page form regarding my past pet history and my current living conditions, I also had to provide 3 character references and the number of my landlord so that they could call and verify that he was aware I was keeping a pet.  Another fact I was unaware of is that animals are never given to people under 21.  On top of all of this, I also had to sign documents affirming that I would spay and neuter my pet and pay 90 dollars.)

Say hello to Boomer.  Yes, we are geeks.

Boomer, originally named Rocky Raccoon, was the loner and most subdued of her 7 other siblings.  As I only have room and resources to handle one cat, she was the obvious choice, so we went ahead and took her home.  More photos can be found here, and I’m sure I’ll be adding more over time.

Copyrights can serve two major purposes:  The first is utilitarian, that in order to induce innovation, we must incentivize creators by allowing them certain rights to their ideas.  This justification is cited in the U.S. Constitution’s Intellectual Property Clause, “To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;”  Obviously a market-driven method, the key here is to recognize that creator profits are a means to an end.

The other major purpose recognizes creator profits as a moral right, and so instead of simply being a means, these guarantees of profit are an end as well.  Curiously, for all of the founding father’s reliance on Locke, this is one subject where they parted ways.  Locke argued that just as property was an extension of self, so too does a creator deserve profits for the work he puts into a product.  This moral justification for intellectual property is widespread through European laws, and you will accordingly find that artists maintain a far greater amount of control over their works, even after they are sold to other parties.

So why does this matter?  In short, the amount of rights awarded to creators are vastly different, depending on what you are trying to produce.  With an economic or market justification, the goal is to award as few rights (and thereby monopoly power) as possible in order to maximize innovation.  However, if you base your laws on a moral justification, the goal becomes to maximize profits, which typically entails ensuring a great swath of rights for the potential creator.

While this may all seem quite theoretical, things come to a head starting in about 1976.  With growing international trade, American politicians want to secure copyrights for their authors in European nations.  In order to establish this system of reciprocity, they end up creating laws that will allow them entry onto the Berne Convention.  The problem is that the convention recognized the moral justification for copyrights, rather than the economic.  As further international treaties have been created such as the TRIPS Accords, this movement of American IP law towards a moral justification has continued on.

The obvious issue though is that copyrights and patents derive their constitutional authority from a clause which is written from an economic justification.  If this statement is read with the “promotion of progress” clause acting as a limitation on the copyright and patent power of Congress, then any law that extends creator profits at the expense of this promotion would be unconstitutional.

While similar arguments have been made before the Supreme Court, none have done so under this precise angle.  Accordingly, if the case Eldred v. Ashcroft were revisited, only this time prosecuted under the attack that the CTEA hampers innovation for the sake of extending creator profits, this would allow a second chance to strike the law down as unconstitutional.

Regardless, it doesn’t matter, because I can’t afford to blow another 130 dollars without going back to paid work.  What I saved working at First Market for that year is already dangerously close to being under what it should be for the rest of the summer.  If I still want to go to law school, and go to one of the best, I’ll have to find another way to balance out what will be a decent but ultimately sub-par GPA.

Without a doubt however, the best part was when I went up to Governor Warner after the speech, and let him know I just turned 21. He was the first candidate that I ever volunteered for, and the third candidate I ever donated money to (behind Obama and Webb). Time and again, he has symbolized the coming wave of principled governance that I hope will assert itself in response to the absurdity (from both sides of the aisle) that has plagued our federal government in the past decade or so. Not surprisingly, Warner is also one of the most formative contemporary politicians over my opinion of how an official should act. So with this in mind, you can imagine my geek-filled flattery when he went to buy my first (legal) alcoholic beverage. As the bartender reached into the fridge to get out a beer, the crowd realized what was going on, and began to sing happy birthday to me. Some random guy who lives downtown also has this event on video, which I can’t decide my feelings on.

While it was a token gesture, I still appreciated it deeply. And for the record, the beer was perfectly chilled.