[HN Gopher] AT&T to pay $23M fine for bribing lawmaker's ally in...
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AT&T to pay $23M fine for bribing lawmaker's ally in exchange for
vote
Author : LinuxBender
Score : 152 points
Date : 2022-10-15 14:49 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
| Kudotap wrote:
| robswc wrote:
| $20k is such a small amount (to bribe a politician at least). I'm
| constantly shocked at how small these bribes always seem to turn
| out. Unless the big ones are just better hidden, haha.
| lordnacho wrote:
| Maybe they are so low risk it's a better business model to
| accept a large number of small bribes rather than a few large
| ones
| bogomipz wrote:
| Yes but this is only a single special interest. A corrupt
| politician makes up for this in volume.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > $20k is such a small amount (to bribe a politician at least).
| I'm constantly shocked at how small these bribes always seem to
| turn out.
|
| I used to be shocked by this, but at some point I realized how
| expensive it must be to get a dollar to a politician. Getting
| $20K to Madigan involves meetings, planning, lawyers,
| accountants, and bagmen. I'm sure the total expense was closer
| to $100-$200K. Spent badly in this case because they still got
| caught, but spent well in the hundreds of cases we don't talk
| about.
|
| It's also capitalism; if Madigan weren't cheap and effective,
| he wouldn't have lasted as long as he did. He might have gotten
| a dozen AT&T-sized bribes that month from different sources.
| jackmott wrote:
| FpUser wrote:
| userabchn wrote:
| I think the solution is not to ban lobbying, etc., but rather to
| reduce the power of politicians so that there is no motivation to
| lobby or bribe them. For example, in my country the taxi drivers
| got politicians to ban Uber through protesting by blocking roads
| and probably pressuring their connections. I don't think
| politicians should have the power to be able to tell people that
| they are not allowed to pick up paying passengers if they want
| to, so there would have been no reason for the taxi drivers to
| gridlock the country as there would have been no potential
| benefit for them in doing so.
| perardi wrote:
| "powerful lawmaker"
|
| Ever heard, vaguely, of Chicago-style politics? Well that's the
| "powerful" guy here: Michael Madigan.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Madigan
|
| https://www.chicagomag.com/chicago-magazine/december-2013/mi...
|
| The longest-serving leader of any level of government in the
| country. He was old-school. No emails. Ran a foot soldier get-
| out-the-vote ground game. Massive conflicts of interest. Possibly
| torpedoed his own daughter's run for governor. Never gave
| interviews.
| cosmodisk wrote:
| The Wikipedia entry alone reads like a script for a new Ozark
| season.
| pcurve wrote:
| "The bill ended AT&T's obligation to provide landline phone
| service to all state residents"
|
| All that for a $22,500 payment. Talk about leverage.
| largbae wrote:
| I don't get it, what is the difference between what was done
| here and paying a lobbyist?
| DannyBee wrote:
| They made the payment through a lobbyist if I read this
| right.
|
| In any case, lobbyists are paid to talk at people, not bribe
| them.
| bluefirebrand wrote:
| Cynically, lobbyists are paid to find ways of bribing
| people without getting caught, or inventing forms of
| bribery that aren't illegal yet.
| daniel-cussen wrote:
| blockwriter wrote:
| Madigan is the Darth Vader of Illinois politics. He was speaker
| of the Illinois House from 97' until 21', when another scandal
| involving ComEd, if I recall correctly, finally forced him to
| resign. His other hustle is lowering the property tax rate of
| insiders - http://www.madigetz.com. Illinois politics is filled
| with the most ludicrously corrupt characters you can find. One
| interesting case from my neck of the woods is the Stephens family
| of Rosemont, who are, nominally, Republicans, but work with
| downstate Democrats to pass red light camera legislation, after
| receiving bribes from the companies that stand to gain -
| https://chicago.suntimes.com/politics/2020/10/18/21516422/re....
|
| Rosemont is one of the weirdest places I've ever encountered.
| It's essentially family-run for-profit operation that caters to
| the corporate clientele of O'Hare airport.
| onetimeusename wrote:
| don't forget that as far as I know, Illinois must hold the
| record for governors who have gone to jail for corruption. 4
| out of the last 10 went to prison.
| blockwriter wrote:
| Reportedly, Madigan sent Pritzker some kind of note with the
| names of all the governors that have come and gone while he
| remained speaker.
| grapescheesee wrote:
| A real life Gotham city.
| dave78 wrote:
| That number could increase soon too. The current governor is
| under federal tax fraud investigation. He bought the mansion
| next door to his, purposely removed the toilets, and then
| declared it uninhabitable to avoid paying hundreds of
| thousands of dollars in taxes.
| Mathnerd314 wrote:
| AFAICT that was settled in 2020 when Pritzker paid the
| extra taxes. I think if there were any charges they would
| have been announced by now. But it does seem Pritzker has
| some connections to Madigan (https://patch.com/illinois/chi
| cago/pritzkers-7m-connection-m...), which might sink his
| re-election campaign. But so far he's doing well in the
| polls.
| dave78 wrote:
| As best I can tell the investigation is still ongoing,
| but for some reason no one in the media really reports on
| it anymore. I think if the investigation had been
| concluded there'd be some reporting on that but I haven't
| found any.
|
| As of early 2022 it was still active:
|
| https://wirepoints.org/why-is-criminal-investigation-of-
| prit...
| Mathnerd314 wrote:
| That's dated 2020. But I guess you're right,
| https://madisonrecord.com/stories/614637059-why-pritzker-
| for... is Dec 2021 and says it's still open. I guess they
| could be delaying the charges while they investigate
| related members like Madigan. But the evasion was in
| 2015, statutory filing date is March 1 2016, and the
| statute of limitations is 6 years after, March 1 2022, so
| their window is already closing (I guess they could still
| do tax year 2016/2017).
| humaniania wrote:
| End their capacity to "lobby" for a long time.
| davidhyde wrote:
| How is the line between lobbying and bribery argued in court?
| There seems to be a large grey area between the two. This seems
| like lobbying to me. A corporation gives money to a politician
| (or party) in return for favourable legislation yet this
| particular incident is deemed illegal. Does the flow of money
| have to be more transparent to the public for it to be legal?
| hedora wrote:
| The powers that be have established complicated rules that
| ensure the line between legal and illegal behavior is
| nonsensical. It's a competitive moat, but for corrupt
| politicians.
| jjulius wrote:
| IANAL, this is probably way off, but at a basic level...
|
| Lobbying = "Hi, I'm a representative for [large donor]. I'd
| like to speak with you about how they feel about an upcoming
| piece of legislation, carefully using my words so that I'm just
| pushing our position on the issue and hoping you'll 'see our
| side' and vote in our favor, even though you and I both know
| what I really mean here."
|
| Bribery: "I will give you $[amount] if you vote [this way]."
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| addendum to Lobbying:
|
| 4 years pass ... "<Name>! long time no see? oh you're out of
| office? Great! we have a cushy consulting position you should
| apply for, you're a shoe in!"
| didgetmaster wrote:
| Also..."Hey we are holding a conference and we would love
| to have you come speak for a half hour at <Big Event>. How
| does a $100K speaking fee sound to you?"
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Moi? That's more akin to veiled bribery. In the immediate
| they're promised an extremely lucrative *completely legal*
| payoff later.
|
| There's little actaul work, the pay is ridiculous, expenses
| covered, children get internships, etc. All legal...if you
| vote for hamburger today.
| mysterydip wrote:
| This, but replace
|
| lobbyist -> military contractor
|
| politician -> high ranking military officer
|
| out of office -> retired from active service
|
| and you now know why some contractors seem to continually
| get ludicrous purchases despite poor performance.
| Pulcinella wrote:
| The article says the bribe was for $22,500. Some how I am both
| insulted and encouraged by how low that amount is. I didn't
| realize that my local PTA could abolish No Child Left Behind
| standardized testing for a few $100 bribes and a coupon to the
| local salad bar!
| zzzeek wrote:
| $23M is a parking ticket for AT&T, subverting democracy might
| warrant a little more pinch maybe?
| yalogin wrote:
| Wow why is it possible to negotiate a criminal charge down to a
| fine? I can understand if it's a civil charge, but it should not
| be possible to do that for a criminal charge. One more example of
| "a corporation can do anything" rule we have in this country.
| jonhohle wrote:
| Especially one where a public servant is advancing its own
| interest at the expense of their constituents. IMHO, the
| penalties for such behavior should be harsh for both parties
| and prevent either from holding office again (and lobbying as
| well). Of the things that have had "zero tolerance" enforcement
| in the past, it's egregious that crimes by politicians, law
| enforcement, and revenue agencies haven't been included.
|
| Of course the laws and prosecutors are managed by the
| individuals involved in the crimes, so what will change?
| swayvil wrote:
| Ah Illinois. That's where I live.
|
| We have the #1 highest taxes in the USA. Yes!
|
| And billions more in taxes gained from a vast legal marijuana
| industry. And our many prisons. And abortion tourism. And
| incredibly expensive rest homes for the elderly. All that tax
| money disappears like magic. Where'd it go??
|
| We are famous for our corrupt politicians and soft-minded
| citizens.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Where'd it go??
|
| Previously unaccounted for labor costs. Bought x amount of
| labor yesterday by paying y > x tomorrow, but not acknowledging
| y > x in any official reports. And, of course, there was most
| likely some loss due to corrupt investments.
|
| Note that federal laws exempted taxpayer funded deferred
| compensation schemes from laws such as ERISA 1974 and PPA 2006
| specifically because taxes can be increased in the future, so
| why bother preventing future taxpayers from having to pay for
| previous generations of taxpayers?
| gautamdivgi wrote:
| The story allegedly is that it goes down the government
| pensions sink hole. That pension thing is crazy in and of
| itself. They put a commitment to fund pensions in the
| constitution. It's nuts.
| pessimizer wrote:
| The government pensions sink hole was investing the cash with
| insiders who lost and stole it all, so it became a constant
| drain to pay out. They put a commitment to fund pensions in
| the constitution because the retirees who worked for bad
| salaries in exchange for these pensions deserve not to have
| to continue to fight for them.
|
| I would ask you to research John Filan for more details, but
| you'll find very little because this kind of history gets
| erased and substituted for angry rants about some appointee
| retiring at 45 on 3x his salary, to his own consulting
| company whose only client is the state, or a lobbying firm.
| As a reaction to those rants, it's retired teachers, DMV
| clerks, and garbagemen that get shit on.
|
| edit: this is absurdly detailed, although it glosses over a
| lot of stuff that Crain's ideologically approves of
| https://www.chicagobusiness.com/static/section/pensions.html
| swayvil wrote:
| Oh what a tasty bit of propagandistic argumentation that is.
|
| The reaction : everybody with a pension, or expecting a
| pension, fearful of losing their nestegg, rallys to defend
| the high taxes. And wailing fills the air, obscuring further
| discussion.
| bogomipz wrote:
| Corporations are people in the US except when they commit crimes,
| then they're just corporations.
| jeremynixon wrote:
| Are these fines close to the business value gained from getting
| this legislation passed over the last 5 years? Seems unlikely.
| Nobody is going to jail. So where is the disincentive?
| duped wrote:
| To hell with monetary gain. It should be prison time for
| executives and board members.
| jcampbell1 wrote:
| The head of AT&T Illinois is very much going to do time in
| federal prison and AT&T provided the evidence to the feds to
| send him there.
| f-securus wrote:
| Cost of doing business. Seems like this had positive ROI.
|
| I'd like for companies that do illegal things to have
| repercussions in line with what an individual would face for
| doing the same thing. Whoever signs off on it at the highest
| level should pay the price.
| schnebbau wrote:
| Agreed. When a company does something illegal, the "company" is
| liable. But it was actually a person within the company who
| made the decision to do this; companies are not sentient. Why
| are the decision makers not held liable instead?
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Margaret Cho has a great comedy bit about how being in a
| relationship turned her into a "low-priced hooker" (her words):
| "If you do the dishes, we can have sex."
|
| It's pretty stunning to me how low-priced these political hookers
| are. $22.5k to end a requirement for AT&T that is surely worth
| many, many millions? I have a difficult time believing the $23M
| is more than the annual savings they get from this bill.
| Companies will just rack this up as the cost of doing business.
| willcipriano wrote:
| The problem with your assumption is that corrupt politicians
| are rare and thus valuable, but the low prices indicate a
| oversupply of corrupt politicians all competing on price.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Even if what you say were true, in any particular government
| there are only a few politicians that can move the needle.
| Some low ranking representative wouldn't be able to do squat
| in most cases. There is a reason AT&T specifically tried to
| court favor with the man who was Illinois Speaker of the
| House for nearly 2 decades.
| cosmodisk wrote:
| I'm not an American, but the situation is very much the same in
| Europe. I always imagined big fat bribes that would buy a
| corrupt politicians or some official big house on an exotic
| island, etc. The reality is most are cheaper than an average
| prostitute on a street. It's shocking what <100K can buy in
| most cases. The ROI is insane.
| revlolz wrote:
| "Under the agreement with AT&T, "the government will defer
| prosecution on the charge for two years and then seek to dismiss
| it if AT&T Illinois abides by certain conditions..."
|
| Slap on the wrist and no real punishment for the largest American
| telecom/ISP.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| ATT shareholders have been punished quite a bit by the
| executives they have chosen.
|
| T-Mobile market cap is $165B, Verizon $152B, and ATT at $106B.
|
| Not that the government punishment should not be worse, but
| kind of breathtaking how badly managed ATT is.
| pempem wrote:
| Is their executive leadership that bad if they're gonna
| wriggle out of a multimillion dollar fine? Seems like another
| case of "too hard to unravel" and "not even gonna matter
| after it exits the headlines"
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Yes, when your 10 year market cap graph looks like this:
|
| https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/T/at-t/market-cap
|
| Compared to your competitors:
|
| https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/VZ/verizon/market
| -...
|
| https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/TMUS/t-mobile-
| us/m...
|
| Getting away for some tiny corruption in one state with a
| tiny amount of business relative to losses in tens of
| billions of dollars is nothing.
| bogomipz wrote:
| ATT and Verizon are two of the shittiest corporations in
| existence. Both carriers raised their prices between $6 and
| $12 a month back in June. This was an obvious "inflation"
| corporate pile on. The two biggest carriers raised their
| rates by the same amount at the same time? Perhaps the
| Justice Department should be looking at that. It's like Ma
| Bell never went away.
|
| >"BELLEVUE, Wash. -- May 31, 2022 -- The Carriers called.
| They want their greedy reputations back. AGAIN. AT&T is
| raising its rates, increasing customers' bills by $6 to $12
| per month."[1]
|
| >"Wireless postpaid consumer customers on all metered shared
| data plans will see a plan rate adjustment charge of $6 per
| month for a single-line phone account and $12 per month for
| multi-line phone accounts, effective with their next bill
| cycle, according to Verizon."[2]
|
| [1] https://www.t-mobile.com/news/offers/takes-aim-at-att-
| and-ve...
|
| [2] https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/verizon-quietly-
| hike...
| quercusa wrote:
| Comcast would like a word...
| syrrim wrote:
| I interpret this to mean the executives are taking both the
| customers and the shareholders for a ride. Consequences for
| them would be good for everyone else.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Executives would be getting paid in stock, which has been
| falling for 10+ years at a time when everyone else's
| skyrocketed. Being a structural monopoly, they should at
| least be able to keep up with inflation given their
| customers have little choice.
| pcurve wrote:
| I didn't realize Tmobile exceeded Verizon in market cap. wow.
| VZ has taken major beating in share price lately because of
| its high debt load.
|
| Looking at Tmobile's plan, https://www.t-mobile.com/cell-
| phone-plans I'm shocked at how low their price is for 3
| phonelines. $90 essential plan is all I need. Similar plan on
| ATT would cost me at least 30%+ more.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Note that for now and up until now, it is widely considered
| that coverage wise, Verizon > ATT > T-Mobile, and so mobile
| network pricing still reflects that.
|
| I doubt T-Mobile would be selling its services for less if
| it had the same coverage Verizon and ATT did, so
| effectively T-Mobile is selling an inferior product.
|
| Both Verizon and ATT tried to pull off a Comcast and tried
| to go vertical by acquiring content makers to avoid being
| just a dumb pipe, but they both failed miserably and ended
| up with a ton of debt.
|
| ATT failed much worse though. They paid $50B for a
| satellite TV broadcaster in 2015. It was already obvious
| that streaming was the future. Either extreme corruption or
| astounding incompetence.
| kotaKat wrote:
| Anyone else remember in 2019 when AT&T got fined $60 million by
| the FTC for their claims about "unlimited data"[1] which was
| followed by an immediate $10/month rate hike for select
| customers[2]?
|
| [1] https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-
| releases/2019/11/... [2]
| https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/6/20952512/att-price-hike-c...
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| > Madigan and McClain were previously indicted on racketeering
| and bribery
|
| Jail time and bans from operating.
|
| This is the only thing that will fix broken America.
|
| Jail time for those involved. and Lifetime bans from operating in
| the respective spaces. The person doing the bribing should be
| banned from a mgmt position, the the law maker should be banned
| from any political office at all levels, the lobby firm should be
| banned from operating in the US.
| rgrieselhuber wrote:
| And a reversal of any legislation / actions taken.
| [deleted]
| pessimizer wrote:
| > Jail time and bans from operating.
|
| You can't get that for an indictment unless you're indicting a
| poor person. In the US we ostensibly punish people when they're
| convicted.
|
| What we need to do is to punish the _appearance of impropriety_
| when it comes to politics, and be very specific about what
| appears to be impropriety. As it is, we can only stop dumb or
| lazy corruption, the kind that people talk about over the phone
| and write in emails.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Agreed. Fines are simply a cost of doing business in cases such
| as these.
|
| Commit a "blue collar" crime, you or I go to jail. But do a
| white collar crime and it's a slap on the wrists.
|
| Time - separated from family, etc. - has value. Money, for the
| amounts these people play with might as well be Monopoly money.
| giardini wrote:
| I think they should pursue the indictments instead. Others'
| thoughts?
| dave78 wrote:
| They are - they added additional charges to the former lawmaker
| (Madigan) who took the bribes[0]. He was already criminally
| charged for similar bribery by the local power company (ComEd).
| Makes me wonder if Comcast or Nicor will be next.
|
| I almost feel sorry for AT&T here. It's hard to overstate just
| how powerful Mike Madigan was in Illinois politics (and he's
| still very influential). He was undoubtedly more powerful than
| the governor. His corruption was legendary and well known by
| everyone, yet hardly anyone seemed to care and people voted for
| him anyway. He acted like a mob boss in the legislature,
| ensuring that all his colleagues would continue to vote him
| into the Speaker position year after year. Any Democrats who
| voted against him as speaker were very publicly punished, since
| he controlled most of the Democratic party money in the state.
| In a state that almost always has a Democratic supermajority,
| there were basically zero checks to his power. Companies like
| AT&T may have been in a bad situation of having no choice but
| to play ball with him just to be able to function in the state.
| Everyone in Illinois knew that you didn't say no to Mike
| Madigan.
|
| [0] https://chicago.suntimes.com/2022/10/14/23404193/mike-
| madiga...
| rtanks wrote:
| I agree
| eyeareque wrote:
| Does this mean the vote that was made will be over turned? (If it
| turned out a single vote passed it)
| washmyelbows wrote:
| isn't this kind of thing common in US politics? what makes this
| specifically actionable?
| bdw5204 wrote:
| If the bribe is paid as a "campaign contribution" to a
| politician or to a group that runs ads to get a politician
| elected, it is "free speech" according to SCOTUS in Citizens
| United v. FEC. If it is paid directly to a politician or to a
| politician's friend, it is illegal bribery.
|
| It would also be perfectly legal to hire a politician or
| regulator who advanced your interests once he's no longer in
| office. There is, in fact, a revolving door between many
| industries and the agencies that regulate them. But you can't
| explicitly promise these individuals a job while they're still
| in office or you committed illegal bribery. A politician also
| can't sell a Senate appointment (as the governor of Illinois
| infamously tried to do after Obama was elected president) but
| he can give it to one of his political allies as a favor and
| reasonably expect that the favor will be repaid in the future.
|
| Of course, these differences aren't particularly meaningful in
| reality but they're very important under the law and anybody
| who is stupid enough to execute their bribes the wrong way will
| probably be punished for bribery even though it would have been
| perfectly legal if they'd done it the _right_ way.
| dvt wrote:
| This is an incredibly reductive take. Campaign contributions
| are carefully monitored. So you can't, like, buy yourself a
| house in Martha's Vineyard with campaign contributions. In
| fact, it's illegal for a politician to even be in contact
| with a super PAC (even though they may be campaigning for
| them). There have been many lawsuits that have settled this.
|
| Citizens United is problematic not because "money is free
| speech" (which, frankly, it is, as we live in a capitalist
| society) but rather because corporations (specifically when
| donating to Super PACs) have _no caps_ on donation sizes. Fun
| fact: that money is not taxable income, by the way. So they
| can (in a roundabout way) essentially fill a friendly
| politician 's coffers "for free."
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| And that's why Citizens united should have focused on
| citizens, not corporations.
|
| Corporations have not votes. Citizens do. A step forward
| could be to bar corporations from any action in the voting
| process (their constituent citizens like employees, owners,
| board etc can do what they wish as citizens, if they're
| citizens) .
| Zircom wrote:
| This is an incredibly naive take. There's countless ways
| and examples of how to get campaign funds into your own
| pocket. Speaking fees, books, your campaign hiring family
| members or friends, buying goods and services for your
| campaign from your own companies, etc. It happens all the
| time.
| dvt wrote:
| > There's countless ways and examples of how to get
| campaign funds into your own pocket.
|
| I mean, while this is _technically_ true, it 's also a
| bit silly to think it's untraceable--many people that
| attempt to do this get in trouble for it[1]. As someone
| that owns a Super PAC, while I don't consider myself some
| kind of absolute authority, I do know some of the
| regulatory hurdles one must go through. I get it, you
| watched John Oliver do his little song and dance, but
| reality is a bit more complicated.
|
| [1] Just to cite a famous-ish case: read about
| Conservative Strikeforce Super PAC.
| Zircom wrote:
| If you could point to exactly where I said it was
| untraceable or that people don't get caught doing it....?
| Yeah. Please don't put words in my mouth.
|
| I'm fully aware it's by no means a risk free or foolproof
| venture, but you're the one being silly if you think the
| amount of cases where people are caught committing crimes
| is anything but a small percentage of people actually
| committing said crimes, especially white collar crimes
| like this. They're just the ones that were unlucky and/or
| not smart enough to get away with it.
|
| And honestly you're being more than a bit condescending
| and not really arguing in good faith, so not interested
| in continuing this conversation. You have a nice day
| though :)
| bdw5204 wrote:
| Plus winning an election means you're more likely to get
| those opportunities to make money. Most members of
| Congress are millionaires [0] and it has nothing to do
| with their salaries (which barely cover the cost of
| maintaining 2 residences given how high cost of living is
| in DC) or their pre-existing wealth before they run for
| office.
|
| [0]: https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/04/majority-
| of-lawmake...
| dvt wrote:
| Are you trying to say that _bribery_ is common in US politics?
| I can 't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, but no, bribery
| is not common nor is it legal. People like to meme about
| lobbyists and PACs and all that. And, while it may be true that
| the system might need tweaks, all of that money is required to
| be reported through the FEC in the case of campaign
| contributions, or via D-2 forms in the case of lobbying.
|
| The problem with under-the-table bribes is that you can't
| "follow the money" so to speak.
| sofixa wrote:
| And what good does "following the money" do anyone? In a
| world with no consequences for politicians' conflict of
| interest, how is that different than flat out bribery?
| noworriesnate wrote:
| Lobbying is legalized bribery, and it's not just companies
| doing the lobbying/bribing, it's foreign countries doing it
| as well[1]. Also, lobbyists don't just influence policy, they
| also influence who gets elected in the first place[2]. The
| most common issue that lobbyist money is spent on has to do
| with the appropriating money from the federal budget[3], so
| in many cases it's likely that the money spent lobbying is
| used to redirect taxpayer funds to pay for more lobbying. In
| other words lobbying is so corrupt that it's easy for any
| citizen to see the corruption--yet people say, "Nah, it's
| fine because it's legal."
|
| This is blatantly anti-democratic. It's a huge mess of
| conflicts of interest. It should not be legal.
|
| [1] https://www.opensecrets.org/fara
|
| [2] https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/top-
| recipients
|
| [3] https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/top-issues
| crazygringo wrote:
| > _Lobbying is legalized bribery_
|
| That's an unhelpful take. Bribery as defined by law is
| inherently illegal, and lobbying is defined by law as
| legal, so legalized bribery is nonsensical. It can't exist.
|
| On the other hand, there are certainly arguments to be made
| for why lobbying can feel anti-democratic. But they come
| smack up against rights to freedom of speech, association,
| etc.
|
| It's incredibly difficult to draw the lines here for what
| is "democratic" and "anti-democratic", where "legitimate
| democratic politics" turns into "corruption". All of
| democracy is about individuals and groups trying to
| influence candidates and politicians, and providing or
| withholding support to do so, and candidates and
| politicians actively seeking support of individuals and
| groups via policy.
|
| Fortunately, we've decided that some lines are relatively
| easy to draw: politicians can solicit/receive contributions
| for campaigns, but not personally. But what you're arguing
| against doesn't have any kind of clear line. Federal money
| and tax breaks go to lots of different groups, and lots of
| different groups lobby. It's hard to see how that either of
| those should be illegal, or how tying them together could
| be made illegal, without the end result being even more
| anti-democratic.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > That's an unhelpful take. Bribery as defined by law is
| inherently illegal, and lobbying is defined by law as
| legal, so legalized bribery is nonsensical. It can't
| exist.
|
| That depends on if you think getting rid of bribery laws
| gets rid of bribery. If you do feel that way, you're very
| compatible with Illinois state bribery law, which allows
| anything outside of a written or recorded quid pro quo.
| But you're out of step with people who think laws should
| be made for a purpose, rather than our purpose being to
| follow laws.
| noworriesnate wrote:
| > so legalized bribery is nonsensical
|
| I don't think the concept of legalized bribery is
| difficult to understand. Yes, it's legal. I'm saying that
| it shouldn't be.
|
| Democracy, or more specifically representative democracy,
| is a form of government where elected persons represent
| the people. The problem with lobbying is that to the
| degree that lobbying happens, the people are represented
| less and those paying the lobbyists are represented more.
| This causes an obvious conflict of interests.
|
| You might think that the degree of lobbying happening in
| Washington is fairly small. In 2021, $3.77B was spent on
| lobbyists[1], and the combined salaries of all
| representatives and senators was around $93m. That means
| that on average, each representative makes $174,000 pre-
| tax, and has over $7m spent to buy their vote on various
| issues. Every. Single. Year.
|
| That's how stark the problem is. Solving the problem is
| hard of course--I think that might be your point?--and
| definitely something that requires a lot of thought and
| discussion. Even if you made lobbying illegal, a huge
| percentage of that money is going to go underground and
| find other ways of influencing Congress.
|
| [1] https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/summary
| Mathnerd314 wrote:
| The point is they have different definitions:
|
| bribery - transfer of value in exchange for official
| action.
|
| lobbying - communicating with an official for purposes of
| influencing official action, not including providing
| public testimony or legally required communications
|
| Legalizing bribery would allow transfer of value.
| Generally information is considered free, so has no
| value, so lobbying is not a transfer of value and hence
| is not bribery (legalized or otherwise). If you want to
| argue that lobbyists are giving officials hot stock tips
| that make the officials millions, hence information has
| value, I suppose it's possible, but it doesn't seem like
| the issue you're addressing.
|
| What you seem to dislike is that many people are paid to
| push laws. But this isn't much different from other forms
| of sales - every company has a marketing department that
| tries to lobby potential customers. There is no
| obligation to buy and similarly the politician has no
| obligation to enact the suggested changes. But without
| direct communication it seems like it would be hard to
| enact sound policy. I don't see any obvious alternatives
| to lobbying to get the required information besides a
| massive "big brother" government surveillance program
| that tries to identify potential problems with big data
| and solve them before they happen.
| crazygringo wrote:
| > _The problem with lobbying is that to the degree that
| lobbying happens, the people are represented less and
| those paying the lobbyists are represented more... You
| might think that the degree of lobbying happening in
| Washington is fairly small._
|
| Believe me, I know how much lobbying there is, I've
| studied it a bit academically. Which is why I'm taking
| issue with how you're characterizing it.
|
| Corporations have legitimate democratic/governance
| concerns. E.g. there can be outdated regulations unfairly
| hampering their ability to do business or innovate. They
| need to be able to bring their concerns to politicians,
| the same way pro-choicers donate to Planned Parenthood to
| lobby, or environmentalists donate to Greenpeace to lobby
| on behalf of the environment, or gun rights advocates
| with the NRA.
|
| Your claim that lobbying is in conflict with "the people"
| is categorically false, as "the people" lobby as well via
| lots of organizations, such as the ones I've just listed.
| "The people" also have interests in corporations not
| being unfairly burdened.
|
| The notion of making lobbying illegal is utterly anti-
| democratic. The idea that you could outlaw voluntary
| domestic organizations from trying to support democratic
| candidates flies in the face of what makes democracy
| work, whether those organizations are non-profit or for-
| profit.
|
| The more relevant issue seems to be more with the notion
| that corporations have more money to lobby with than the
| general population does. However even with that, some
| academic research suggests that the issue isn't so much
| to do with money, but rather the fact that corporations
| often lobby on behalf of niche/arcane issues such as
| specific corporate regulations that voters are often
| virtually entirely unaware of. So it's not so much
| corporations vs. "the people", but corporations vs. "the
| people don't even care", or corporations vs. other
| corporations.
| CyberDildonics wrote:
| Don't forget that corporations are people, except when it comes
| to three strike laws and being put in prison for life.
| barbariangrunge wrote:
| Is 23M more or less than the benefit that they got for this
| bribe?
| shkkmo wrote:
| It isn't clear, but I think only the indictment against the
| company itself is being put on hold. The CEO, the lawmaker and
| the intermediary are still being prosecuted?
| victor106 wrote:
| Companies commit a crime and pay fines, Individuals commit the
| same crime and go to prison.
| KingOfCoders wrote:
| This stops when CEOs go to jail not when companies pay the fines.
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