Reference: The enemy of my enemy is my friend
EARLIER this month we learned about AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) walking into the UPC debate. It wasn't going to be a helpful intervention because, as we noted the other day, we assumed that Team UPC would say things (publicly or behind the scenes) like, "are you against the UPC? What are you, with AfD or something?"
"As a reader recently told us, if you want something to die in politics, then you simply associate it with AfD."Either way, earlier today Kluwer Patent blogger (likely Bristows) wrote this piece about the UPC complainant. It starts with discussion about the complainant and then lumps in the following paragraph: "Later today, the German Parliament will discuss a motion of the right-wing Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), which is based on two of the arguments of the constitutional challenge. The AfD motion argues that the UPCA ratification bill did not have the requisite majority of two thirds of the members of the Bundestag and that UPC judges will not be independent since they are appointed by a panel which also includes attorneys at law and only for six years, and calls for the repeal of two acts concerning the Unified Patent Court and the Unitary Patent. The motion is not expected to get wide, if any support."
Bristows' Richard Pinckney then wrote in their own blog (which barely anyone reads) that "the Bundestag (German parliament) will debate later today the motion by the AfD (Alternative für Deutschland, Alternative for Germany) political party calling for the repeal of legislation enabling Germany to participate in the Unified Patent Court (UPC) and unitary patent system."
"It's as though they want Germans to believe that to support UPC is to oppose AfD. This was predictable."This is how they prefer to frame this. It's as though they want Germans to believe that to support UPC is to oppose AfD. This was predictable. Team UPC wrote some hours ago that the debate/motion was "[...] Moved to 18:50 CET. [...] AfD mentions constitutional complaint and indicates that complaint may be successful. Claims parliament should be the one rectifying the formal error of allegedly insufficient quorum. [...] SPD submits AfD merely destructive, otherwise simply await judgment of Constitutional Ct, which may deal w t very issues. Bundestag had provided an opinion upon request of ConstCt concluding that Acts were in line with Constitution. [...] Matter is referred to the relevant committees. Debate closed. Motion no chance of succeeding."
Benjamin Henrion, a Belgian, wrote: "Listening to the UPC debate at the Bundestag, they all praise the EU while the UPC is not an EU instrument. Crazy to see they do not get the basics."
Yes, these politicians hardly know what they talk about and what they support/oppose and sign/won't sign. It's pretty incredible and it's worrying to see so-called 'democracy' being reduced to labels like "unitary", "community", "EU", and "unified" (different incarnation of the same thing). In the US it sometimes seems like they pass bills based on the name/title of the bill rather than actual contents/substance.
This is why AfD's involvement could prove to be toxic. Perhaps, at the end, all they'll know about UPC is that AfD is against it. The question regarding UPC becomes whether one is pro- or anti-EU even if UPC isn't the EU. One can be against Brexit and against UPC at the same time. Many are.
Speaking of Belgium, watch this incredibly incredulous tweet that the EPO retweeted some hours ago. "Patents and innovation are not the same thing," I told them, and the EPO "is collapsing, [having] granted patents [that] are [of] bad quality..."
We already wrote about these figures that are cited. e.g. in: