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The Second Half of Watergate Was Bigger, Worse, and Forgotten by the Public
- readhn 8y ago"I don't know the solution for this" The solution is simple - its called the "rule of LAW". These corps and gov people should be prosecuted to full extent; giving/taking bribes should be illegal just as being caught with a plane full of heroin. The problem that we have is that law system is not really working when it comes to "big guns". They have politicians and lawyers/judges in their pockets/protecting them.
- sjg007 8y agoaka "Too big to fail"
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- bluetwo 8y agoIt is already illegal.
- erikpukinskis 8y agoThen we need to find enforcement.
- fjsolwmv 8y agoPerhaps it's not so simple after all, if the simple solution isn't working.
- Mvandenbergh 8y agoVictimless (they're not really, but the victims are diffuse and don't know that the crime is happening) crimes are inherently hard to prosecute. That's because the first step in a criminal investigation is usually someone calling the police to report that something has happened. The hard part of prosecuting a mugger or a thief is finding out and then proving who committed the crime - that a crime took place is usually obvious. The hard part of prosecuting "victimless" white-collar crimes is even knowing that anything has happened, that's before having to prove that what happened was illegal and determining exactly who did it.
- bluetwo 8y agoI'll be honest: I really think Trump won at this point and the US of A has lost. We will never see the Mueller Report.
- bluetwo 8y agoDon't hate the messenger, people.
- akkartik 8y agoThe two reasons given to outlaw foreign bribery are awesome: a) Selfishly, it has unanticipated consequences for foreign policy. b) Altruistically, it causes developing countries to misspend money on stuff they don't really need (mostly arms). The second is particularly compelling. Laws outlawing foreign bribery seem like a powerful weapon against the resource curse (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_curse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_curse).
- christophilus 8y ago> Senator Charles Percy of Illinois observed, “I am convinced that creative minds in the name of greed can concoct schemes faster than we can get legislation against them.” That much, at least, hasn’t changed.
- cft 8y agoWhy is this posted on HN? Is this currently relevant to technology, other than it's timed to show that the Democrats/Silicon Valley are getting ready for an impeachment attempt?
- dang 8y agoWhat's on-topic for HN is not just what's currently relevant to technology. In particular, historical material has always been welcome here. Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
- booleandilemma 8y agoWatergate-gate?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- Medox 8y agoReminds me of the Stupid Watergate "series" (2 episodes) from John Oliver's Last Week Tonight: 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVFdsl29s_Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVFdsl29s_Q 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOVPStnVgvU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOVPStnVgvU
- Spooky23 8y agoThe corruption back then was staggering. LBJ had attorneys flying money in briefcases back to Texas. Plus the fig leaf if his wife’s radio station purchase, which attracted all sorts of advertising from folks looking for favors.
- mlthoughts2018 8y agoThe most staggering thing continues to be that there is not sustained public outrage to a great enough degree to enforce reform. Like, boiling rage that disrupts you from managing the basic details of living your regular life in a continuous, never-ending, daily manner from the moment of becoming aware of the degree of corruption until forever into the future, to such a degree that even after carefully introspecting about the pros and cons of being that unhealthily outraged, missing out on life’s joys, risking that the outrage never successfully overcomes the corrupt actors perpetrating these moral offenses, even after really thinking about all that and reflecting on the trade-offs of pursuing passions, love, family, whatever, you _still_ are left with absolutely undissipatable astronomical outrage governing your every waking decision and you pedantically boycott every company, protest everything, risk sounding like a crazy kook to normalized masses who somehow can just shrug off the outrage to live a life (which is precisely 100% of the reason why the corruption lives and grows), and your balanced opinion really, really is just that there is no possible reaction but continuous realtime outrage.
- PhantomGremlin 8y agoThe most staggering thing continues to be that there is not sustained public outrage to a great enough degree to enforce reform. One of Aesop's fables is The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Here's a recent story that I, and most others, didn't find credible: [1]She also alleged that at some parties, boys lined up by a bedroom to "gang-rape" incapacitated girls and claimed those in the lineup included Kavanaugh and Judge. Even the Democrats finally realized that they had gone too far: "Democrats and the country would have been better off if Mr. Avenatti spent his time on his Iowa vanity project rather than meddling in Supreme Court fights," The point is that if you try to manufacture "sustained public outrage" about everyone and everything, eventually people tune you out. there is no possible reaction but continuous realtime outrage That's not a winning strategy. You will achieve better results if you pick your battles. [1] https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/06/politics/democrats-avenatti-swetnick-accusation/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/06/politics/democrats-avenatti-s...
- gallerdude 8y agoThe left thinks bad corporations are responsible for the ills of society, while the right thinks bad government is responsible. I think we just need to understand that A. both sides of the bribe are wrong and B. big is bad. I don't know the solution for this - absence of government just leads to less restrictions for corporations, and absence of corporations will mean that worse corporations will be tolerated by the market.
- dragonwriter 8y ago> The left thinks bad corporations are responsible for the ills of society, No, we don't. > while the right thinks bad government is responsible. More “libertarians” than “the right”; they overlap but not are not equivalent. (In fact, libertarians also overlap with the left.) > absence of government just leads to less restrictions for corporations No, because corporations are creatures of government. Absence of government (or just absence of government chartering corporations) means no corporations, not unregulated corporations.
- sandworm101 8y agoAbsence of government chartering corporations was a thing not that long ago. It doesn't mean no big businesses, it just means a return to partnerships and personal liabilities as the primary entity. Some businesses today still operate on these older principals, notably law firms. They seem to do their evil well enough despite not being corporations. So I doubt that much would change.
- carrja99 8y agoMeanwhile the president is working on a sequel and it will be bigger and better than ever!
- joshmn 8y agoOnly the best!
- garysahota93 8y agoThis is wild. I honestly had no idea, but I am really glad that Hacker News showed me this. I really wonder what the implications have this has been all of this time.
- skybrian 8y agore: "The SEC filed an injunctive order against Gulf Oil on the grounds that their bribes were material information that should have been disclosed to investors, and that by failing to disclose them, it violated existing federal securities laws." Huh, that looks like an early example of Matt Levine's rule that everything bad is also securities fraud. (From before the anti-bribery law was passed.)
- tanderson92 8y agoI commented at almost the precise moment (great minds!) of your comment on this fact, and cc'ed matt into the discussion: https://twitter.com/wokeberia/status/1065053152775270400 https://twitter.com/wokeberia/status/1065053152775270400 The followup tweet includes my suspicion this might have been the first because they first discovered the lack of a law, and creatively got around that fact.
- mcguire 8y agoAl Capone was imprisoned on tax charges.
- tanderson92 8y agoNot securities fraud.
- Dylan16807 8y agoNot for lack of his other activities being illegal.
- scottlocklin 8y agoI would be more shocked if corporations weren't overtly bribing people. Billionaires and PACs as well. Church's other investigations were bigger, worse and also forgotten by the public.
- Latteland 8y agoits against the law now for us corporations to pay bribes, and it's not too uncommon for them to get caught and have penalties. https://www.sec.gov/spotlight/fcpa/fcpa-cases.shtml https://www.sec.gov/spotlight/fcpa/fcpa-cases.shtml
- cimmanom 8y agoThe trouble here presumably is that the penalties are anything less than jailing of the entire C-suite and/or complete dissolution of the corporation.
- matt4077 8y agoAnd while we're at it: death penalty for any crime (or misdemeanor). Including the criminal's family! That should stop these murderers and jaywalkers once and for all!
- turndown 8y agoWhile we all appreciate your strawman, I would encourage you to actually think about situations where the law actually does implement punishments that are beyond what would be considered proportionate, and when it does the opposite.
- briatx 8y agoPaying a penalty for getting caught breaking a law sounds a bit like a bribe to me.
- boomboomsubban 8y agoIt's funny that an investigation over "bribes" paid to Nixon led to laws changing and a system where US politicians are the only legal "bribery" target.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- ironic_ali 8y ago"funny"
- gammateam 8y agoAs in convenient, if you are playing this game by an effective set of rules yet
- matt4077 8y agoThere's a difference between "bribes" and "bribes". A bribe is usually understood to be of benefit to the politician personally. This sort of corruption is actually incredibly rare in the US. What is, unfortunately, very common are payments to their campaigns. These are legal and, since Citizen United, basically unlimited. There are, however, rather strict rules as to how they can be used. And as that Republican idiot from California is currently experiencing, these rules are enforced. I'm not making apologies for the undeniable harms of the latter practice. But it is different, and marginally less evil . As to the relative evilness: the "traditional" bribe is strictly more useful to a politicians, because they always had the option to convert it to campaign money. That option does not exist in the other direction. I think it's important to appreciate such nuances. First, because it stops the corroding effect of cynicism on your soul. And, second, if we condemn everything at the same level of maximum evilness, any change that is not instant paradise is indistinguishable to the status quo. Because Paradise no longer exists (or is now a strip club), nothing will ever happen.
- iscrewyou 8y agoBribes buy influence. “Payments to campaign” buy influence. Unlimited “payments to campaign” buy unlimited influence. With a given amount of resources at the congressman’s office, unlimited “payments to the campaign” buy up influence at the expense of other constituents. Which is what bribes do. Before Citizens United, I may have agreed with you. Not anymore.
- Sniffnoy 8y agoI'm confused -- in what sense was this the "second half of Watergate"? I don't see any obvious relation to Watergate as it's usually known.
- frotak 8y agoThis > Its revelation that multinational corporations, including some of the most prestigious brands in the United States, had been making illegal contributions to political parties not only at home but in foreign countries around the world would later be described by Ray Garrett, the chairman of the SEC, as “the second half of Watergate, and by far the larger half.” Is in reference to this: > the Multinational Corporation Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee; the Subcommittee on International Economic Policy of the House Committee on International Relations; and the President's Task Force on Questionable Corporate Payments Abroad See: http://www.djcl.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/FOREIGN-BRIBERY-BY-AMERICAN-MULTINATIONAL-CORPORATIONS-A-STATUS-REPORT.pdf http://www.djcl.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/FOREIGN-BRIBE...
- pvg 8y agoThe Church committee and related investigations, reforms, etc were a direct consequence of the main Watergate scandal.
- jhallenworld 8y agoThe part about the OECD was interesting. I can see the argument that Western countries could be at a commercial disadvantage vs. Russia and especially China. The so-called BRIC countries should somehow be encouraged to cooperate. http://www.oecd.org/about/membersandpartners/ http://www.oecd.org/about/membersandpartners/
- gcb0 8y agocoup in brazil was the cut the head of BRIC. brazil was the most moderate, that had any chance of upsetting US powers in europe and americas. now it's russia or china vs the world under the US.
- AndyMcConachie 8y agoTwo things. 1) This wasn't really forgotten by the public. There was a law passed by Congress meant to address this, which if anyone has worked in American corporate governance is well aware of. The article mentions the FCPA. 2) The much more interesting question about Watergate is what were the Plumbers looking for? Why did they conduct their break ins? This was not understood at the time. We now know about Nixon's successful attempt to torpedo the Vietnam peace talks in '68. Something Mark Felt didn't even know. We also now know that LBJ knew about it as well right before the elections in '68. LBJ didn't make it public, but instead kept a file on it that later came to be held in his presidential library. Nixon and the plumbers were likely looking for this file. They never found it and it wasn't until a researcher in the mid-90's discovered it in LBJ's presidential library. This information, had it been made public, would have destroyed Nixon.
- moccachino 8y agoTorpedoing peace talks in order to win an election. Such a despicable act, I don't know any words fitting for it. I know it was not the first or last time in history this has been done, but since this instance can be proven I would suggest that some choice sites such as Nixon's birthplace should be torn down, the ground burned and it left permanently in ashes as a reminder.
- TheOtherHobbes 8y agoSOP in Washington. LBJ's escalation of the Vietnam War made his corporate sponsors an absolute fortune. More recently, Theresa May's backing for military action in Syria pumped the stock price of British Aerospace, which happens to be part-owned by a capital fund that employ's Theresa May's husband. The real problem with politics is that very few people understand how absolutely amoral and cynical it is. LBJ still had some interest in public service, but for a terrifying number of modern politicians the public service ethos is a fig leaf. The real morality is narcissism and greed. As long as money keeps rolling in no one cares how it's made or who gets damaged in the process.
- ThomPete 8y ago
- anonymousDan 8y agoThe FCPA is an impressive piece of legislation and a credit to the USA. Do most other countries have equivalent laws I wonder?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- SamWhited 8y agoIf you're interested in this era and all the various scandals around the time of Watergate (but not necessarily related to it), Rachel Maddow's "Bag Man" is a pretty good podcast that focuses on Agnew and the team of prosecutors investigating him: https://www.msnbc.com/bagman https://www.msnbc.com/bagman
- PavlovsCat 8y ago> Watergate was a matter of a bunch of guys from the Republican National Committee breaking in a Democratic Party office for essentially unknown reasons and doing no damage. Okay, that's petty burglary, it's not a big deal. Well, at the exact time that Watergate was discovered, there were exposures in the courts and through the Freedom of Information Act of massive FBI operations to undermine political freedom in the United States, running through every administration back to Roosevelt, but really picking up under Kennedy. It was called "COINTELPRO" (short for "Counterintelligence Program"), and it included a vast range of things. > It included Gestapo-style assassination of a Black Panther leader; it included organizing race riots in an effort to destroy the black movements; it included attacks on the American Indian Movement, on the women's movement, you name it. It included fifteen years of FBI disruption of the Socialist Worker's Party - that meant regular FBI burglaries, stealing membership lists and using them to threaten people, going to businesses and getting members fired from their jobs, and so on. Well, that fact alone-the fact that for fifteen years the FBI had been burglarizing and trying to undermine a legal political party - is already vastly more important than the fact that a bunch of Keystone Kops broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters one time. The Socialist Workers Party is a legal political party, after all - the fact that they're a weak political party doesn't mean they have less rights than the Democrats. And this wasn't a bunch of gangsters, this was the national political police: that's very serious. And it didn't happen once in the Watergate office complex, is was going on for fifteen years, under every administration. And keep in mind, the Socialist Workers Party episode is just some tiny footnote to COINTELPRO. In comparison to this, Watergate is a tea party. > Well, look at the comparison in treatment - I mean, you're aware of the comparison in treatment, that's why you know about Watergate and you don't know about COINTELPRO. So what does that tell you? What it tells you is, people in power will defend themselves. The Democratic Party represents about half of corporate power, and those people are able to defend themselves; the Socialist Workers Party represents no power, the Black Panthers don't represent any power, the American Indian Movement doesn't represent any power - so you can do anything you want to them. > Or take a look at the Nixon administration's famous "Enemies List," which came out in the course of Watergate…You've heard of that, but did you hear about the assassination of Fred Hampton? No. Nothing ever happened to any of the people who were on the Enemies List, which I know perfectly well, because I was on it - and it wasn't because I was on it that it made the front pages. But the FBI and the Chicago police assassinated a Black Panther leader as he lay in his bed one night during the Nixon administration (On December 4, 1969). Well, if the press had any integrity at all, if the Washington Post had any integrity, what they would have said is, "Watergate is totally insignificant and innocuous, who cares about any of that in comparison with these other things." But that's not what happened, obviously. And that just shows again, very dramatically, how the press is lined up with power. -- Noam Chomsky, "Understanding Power" (2002)
- fallingfrog 8y agoNone of this is surprising at all, and most likely it’s chump change compared with the institutional criminality going on right now, today. Ever wonder why the price of insulin goes up 5% per year, every year? Yeah. Bribes, price fixing, and market manipulation.