Author of Controversial Copyright Reform Brief Fired from GOP Committee

File under “E” for Excessive Response.

The scarpe jordan Republican Study Committee reportedly fired a young staffer named Derek Khanna following the backlash that ensued from the publication of his policy brief, entitled “Three Myths about Copyright Law and Where to Start to Fix It.”

Whatever one might think of the arguments Khanna made in the brief (personally, I agree to an extent with some and entirely reject others), firing him for providing input that wasn’t appreciated by certain party members and/or their campaign donors strikes me as more than a bit heavy-handed.

While I think some of Khanna’s reasoning is flawed, I can’t bring myself to seeing authoring a controversial brief as a firing offense. It’s not as though Khanna advocated genocide, for Pete’s sake; he merely chipped in his own two cents on some aspects of copyright law that he’s far from being the only critic of.

Here’s hoping that this isn’t harbinger of a broader rejection of opposing views that might take root in Congress’ ongoing discussion of copyright reform. Clearly, changes are needed to the current system, whether you favor stronger copyright protections, or a more permissive approach; if we can’t even listen to each other’s opposing ideas, the reform conversation is going nowhere, fast.http://www.jordan2016.it