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		<title>Myhrvold and Boehner</title>
		<dateCreated>Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:49:00 GMT</dateCreated>
		<dateModified>Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:36:02 GMT</dateModified>
		<ownerName>Dave Winer</ownerName>
		<ownerEmail>dave.winer@gmail.com</ownerEmail>
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		<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:49:00 GMT" ctSaves="26" flPreview="false" id="2011.08.06.1202" server="xmlrpc://cms.scripting2.com:5337/RPC2" storySerialNum="1202" text="Myhrvold and Boehner" type="scripting2Post" url="http://scripting.com/stories/2011/08/06/myhrvoldAndBoehner.html" username="davewiner" versionClient="0.44" versionServer="0.44" whenLastSave="Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:36:03 GMT">
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:40:28 GMT" pgfnum="8564" text="I finally listened to the &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/441/when-patents-attack&quot;&gt;This American Life&lt;/a&gt; on software patents. Now I understand what Nathan Myhrvold is doing, "></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:40:32 GMT" pgfnum="8565" text="It's very similar to what John Boehner did to the US economy, only Myhrvoid is doing it in tech."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:49:51 GMT" pgfnum="8570" text="Also Myrvold has raised $5 billion and has only made $2 billion so far in settlements and judgements. His VCs no doubt expect a 10x return or greater. You can do the math. He's got to extract at least another $48 billion. He's just getting started. That ultimately has to chill the investment environment in tech. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:55:17 GMT" pgfnum="8571" text="&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2011/05/intellectual-ventures-revealing-investors.html&quot;&gt;Here's a list&lt;/a&gt; of his investors."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:43:32 GMT" pgfnum="8568" text="BTW, I said &lt;a href=&quot;http://scripting.com/stories/2011/07/30/eitherBoehnerLosesOrWeDo.html&quot;&gt;during the hostage crisis&lt;/a&gt;, that either Boehner loses or the United States loses. As it turns out, he didn't lose. We lost as did the creditors of the United States. The ones who bought our AAA debt and ended up with AA+ debt. And who knows where it's headed from here."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 19:59:06 GMT" pgfnum="8572" text="&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.flickr.com/photos/scriptingnews/6015697458/in/photostream&quot;&gt;&lt;img src=&quot;http://scripting.com/images/2011/08/06/clark.gif&quot; width=&quot;65&quot; height=&quot;173&quot; border=&quot;0&quot; align=&quot;right&quot; hspace=&quot;15&quot; vspace=&quot;5&quot; alt=&quot;A picture named clark.gif&quot;&gt;&lt;/a&gt;It's a good argument whether we should care what S&amp;P says after what we learned about them in the subprime meltdown of 2008. But the truth is &lt;i&gt;we downgraded our own debt.&lt;/i&gt; It doesn't take much imagination to see how a creditor of the US would feel. We just debated whether we would deliberately default. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:08:39 GMT" pgfnum="8580" text="I know how my creditors at Living Videotext would have reacted if they knew we were doing that (we never did). Quite a few times we had trouble paying our bills, but we worked with creditors and always let them know where they stood. We never considered not paying our bills when we had the means to. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:09:59 GMT" pgfnum="8581" text="That's what's so fucked up about what the US govt did (net-net, doesn't matter who's to blame). We openly debated whether we were going to stiff our creditors, when we had the means not to. That's a real confidence buster. We're super-lucky we don't have any competition in the reserve currency business, or we'd be melting down now, even given that we supposedly averted the default. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sun, 07 Aug 2011 01:34:18 GMT" pgfnum="8582" text="We're like a football team that has the ball and runs in the wrong direction, into our own endzone."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:02:38 GMT" pgfnum="8573" text="Anyway, when it comes to blame there's no doubt who is to blame. Boehner could have taken one for Uncle Sam. He would have lost his job as Speaker, that's pretty clear, but there &lt;i&gt;were&lt;/i&gt; enough Democratic and Republican votes to pass the debt ceiling without any of the monkey business. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:03:36 GMT" pgfnum="8574" text="Just as Nathan Myhrvold is already worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and in no way needs the money he's going to make from his patent protection business. "></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:04:34 GMT" pgfnum="8575" text="I try not to make moral arguments, but in the case of Myrvold and Boehner, you can't avoid it."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:08:11 GMT" pgfnum="8577" text="These guys are so &lt;a href=&quot;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Superman_enemies&quot;&gt;perfectly evil&lt;/a&gt; and on such a huge scale, it's as if they were out of a DC Comic. Like Lex Luthor or The Joker."></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:09:33 GMT" pgfnum="8578" text="Where is our Man of Steel?"></outline>
			<outline created="Sat, 06 Aug 2011 20:27:48 GMT" pgfnum="8579" text="PS: Thanks to &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.whatisleft.org/&quot;&gt;Chris Sacca&lt;/a&gt; for having the guts to talk with TAL. He was the only one from Silicon Valley who did. "></outline>
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