In an interview with Christian Broadcasting Network’s David Brody, Sharron Angle declared that she’s “glad” Harry Reid reposted her old website — a sharp departure from her prior position, when she was threatening a lawsuit for stealing her intellectual property.
During the interview, Angle talked about the retooling of her website after she won the Republican primary for Senate in Nevada.
“What you need to do is condense this into small very precise statements about who you are and so that’s what they began doing was making those precise statements. We’re not completely there yet,” said Angle. “We’re still working on those precise statements but everything that Harry Reid has posted on ‘The Real Sharron Angle’ (website) — and I’ll promote that website actually because that is the old website. It won the primary and I would like people to go there and look at my positions and it’s good that he’s paying for that so I’m glad.”
After she won the Republican primary a month ago, Angle’s campaign took down most of its website, and later replaced it with a relaunched version that toned down her more conservative positions. But the Reid campaign had saved the old version, and put up a website called “The Real Sharron Angle,” reproducing the old content. Then the Angle campaign sent them a cease-and-desist letter, alleging violation of copyrights for Reid having reposted Angle’s old campaign literature. In response, the Reid campaign briefly took down the site — then made some slight modifications, such as removing some e-mail sign-up boxes that had been left intact, and put it right back up again.
Angle then continued to threaten legal action. “Well your website is like you, it’s your intellectual property. So they can’t use something that’s yours, intellectual property, unless they pay you for it or get your permission,” she said in a radio interview, also adding: “Well we are going to pursue it. I don’t think that Harry is above the law. He needs to obey the law. If you and I need to obey the law, Harry isn’t immune. He needs to obey the law as well.”
This position put Angle in a strange spot, from a First Amendment standpoint — a politician arguing that their opponents could not reproduce their own statements and literature for the purposes of mocking them and telling people to vote against them.
The TPM Poll Average gives Angle a lead of 45.9%-41.7%.
Eric Kleefeld
Eric Kleefeld joined TPM as an intern for the final months of the 2006 midterm elections, and then kept showing up for work. His other interests include guitars, old comic books and the politics of various English-speaking countries.
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