I don't have time to respond properly, but even though I'm a bit of a copyright hawk myself I'm strongly in favor of the Khanna propositions. When the 'limited times' exceed the median human lifespan, the effective term of copyright for most citizens is infinite. I think most of the goals identified in the Khanna memo were shockingly sensible, even the DJ bits.
That said, it's not sensible in terms of political capital; even if the Republican party decides to leap in the 21st century and propose radical reforms, there are bigger fish to fry in the next Congress, like tax/entitlement reform, immigration and so forth.
Of course I think we need a third party and my occasional hobby is drafting its manifesto, but that isn't exactly a short-term project either.
Strong agree that we need to reform copyright terms! (I'd also be happy with compulsory licensing of some sort, so there'd be some transparency in licensing and, more importantly, so that lawful access would become more convenient [with more providers offering services] instead of fighting losing battles against piracy).
But of course, this memo doesn't just say "reform copyright terms". It also says, "we need to address the problem of DMCA abuse" (everyone in the content industry and lots of reasonable outsiders, although by no means most of them in Internet circles, would say the opposite --- that's it's so hard to address blatant outright "no copyright intended" infringement today that new vectors for suppressing piracy are needed) and "we need to enable DJs".
I like Girl Talk O.K., and "It Takes A Nation" is among my favorite albums, but the needs of DJs and remix artists are (a) not at the top of the national agenda even for copyright reform, and (b) mostly not a real problem given the economics of electronic/remix music today anyways, most of which isn't and, like most music, can't be compensated through traditional label-style recorded music sales anyways. It's not like DJs are being raided at live shows for their samples.
That said, it's not sensible in terms of political capital; even if the Republican party decides to leap in the 21st century and propose radical reforms, there are bigger fish to fry in the next Congress, like tax/entitlement reform, immigration and so forth.
Of course I think we need a third party and my occasional hobby is drafting its manifesto, but that isn't exactly a short-term project either.