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New Electronic Design Column
Dear Readers: Those in Washington who are selling out our patent system to foreign interests are rushing a new bill (HR 400) through on a "fast track" basis. Because HR 400 will most likely be voted on before my new Electronic Design column can run, I am taking the unprecedented step putting it up on my page before it runs in the magazine. Here is an unedited preview copy of column #83.
John D. Trudel, April 4, 1997
The young ask the best questions. "Why is the sky blue?" A young woman who is staff to a newly elected member of Congress asked "Why are people trying to destroy the U.S. patent system?"
The Great Patent Sell-Out is back with a vengeance. The Patent Wars, which I have written about several times in these pages, have flared up again. Like a video game monster, you keep shooting it and it keeps coming back. A new bill, HR 400, is being rushed through Congress. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher calls it the "Steal American Technology Act" because it legalizes technology theft and industrial espionage.
My web page contains details. The societal issue is high wage U.S. jobs for you and your kids. If you weaken patent protection, jobs move offshore faster and wages fall. The business issue is profit margins. Why innovate if anyone can steal from you? But if you don’t innovate, your products become commodities with razor thin margins. To prevent this, write Congress now!
I spent an hour trying to educate this young person about products, innovation, and international business. By the end I felt very old and tired. She kept asking why those pushing for a Sell-Out persisted. My cynical answer, "Money," just did not compute for her.
I reflected on our conversation. I dimly remembered that those selling out our system once had used rallying cries like "world harmonization" and "submarine patents." Still, these PR fictions were long ago crisped into cinders under the glaring light of testimony.
Why does the onslaught persist? Ron Brown, who started it, is dead and buried. The timing is bad. Bloodhounds are hot on the trail of foreign "donations." Each week sees a major new scandal, and criminal investigations are starting.
HR 400 is a cookie-cutter copy of last year’s HR 3460, which was disowned by those it claimed to benefit. HR 3460 never even made it to a vote, and the authors were not reelected.
Still, Bruce Lehman, assistant Secretary of Commerce and Honorable Commissioner of Patents, remains. Lehman signed the original letters of agreement with Japan to Sell-Out our Patent System. He is a politically correct icon, well defended, and far enough down in the bureaucracy that Congress does not have a good shot at him. He knows this and exploits it.
Lehman’s discreet Japanese fund raising has so far escaped the notoriety of the Indonesian and Chinese funds that flowed in down the hall. Compared to White Water, Donor Gate, and such odoriferous events, his money is relatively "clean."
If HR 400 passes, Lehman stands to gain personally. If the Patent Office is privatized (critics say "piratized") he would run it, and "gifts" to patent office officials, like him, would be legalized. Let me see now, if I could run a private toll gate through which all U.S. technology must flow, could I make a lot of money? Well, yes, I probably could. Also, Lehman is also on record, strangely, as viewing his job as the "regulation" of technology.
A new global survey from ACME (Association of Management Consulting Firms) says that 88% of clients now say growth is more important than cost cutting. How can you grow? If a U.S. firm, return to innovation. If a foreign firm, seek cheap access to U.S. technology. That dynamic makes Mr. Lehman a very dangerous individual. Perhaps he is why the Sell-Out persists?
© 1997, The Trudel Group
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