Mary in Kentucky, it looks like Joe fixed my earlier garbled post, so you can compare my luck in contacting my Senator back in 1998 with Michael Eisner's luck in getting the ear of a Senator that isn't even his own state's.

If you read the record carefully you'll notice that the bill passed Congress without roll call votes. Almost any member, except for its sponsors, can deny having voted for it! (In the Senate, I'm not sure there was even a quorum, though I may not be interpreting the Congressional Record right on that point.) President Clinton signed it without making any announcement (though the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, which was signed on the same day, was signed with some fanfare) explaining why the public's rights must be further denied. I don't think it likely that the CTEA will be legislatively repealed, but maybe if we make our disgust at the cynical way the bill was passed (as well as the unreasonable term itself) we can keep a future Congress from extending the term another 20 years. The best chance for the overthrow of the CTEA itself is probably the court challenge.

If you're interested in the legislative aspects of this whole sorry tale, visit Professor Karjala's web page at http://www.public.asu.edu/~dkarjala. The discussion of "What are the issues and what happened ?" is here.

T.