This abuse of overbroad patents - including software patents - isn't your average bad idea. It is powerfully toxic to innovation. In the global context, it is literally a threat to human progress. For the USA in particular, patent trolls are a threat to its continued eminence as a superpower.

So it's strange that some in congress still support the current patent situation. I want to believe those who serve there are generally smart and competent, regardless of whether their opinion on something agrees with mine. But the pro-troll arguments seem massively short-sighted.

Allowing the current situation to continue would be massively harmful to our descendants. I'm grateful there seems to be swelling bipartisan support to end it.