7 ms·

> The answer is to outlaw lobbyists, it would fix a lot of problems. That, and enact term limits for Congress. That will fix even more. When you think there ar

• norswap 8y ago
  Would it really be unconstitutional? The right of petition cannot abrogated, but surely one can outlaw the exchange of political favors for money or other forms of compensations. Yes, actually showing that political favors were exchanged for money is tricky, but still, it's better than nothing and it changes the whole discussion from "it's the system" to "who's doing something bad and hiding it?".
  • wool_gather 8y ago
    > outlaw the exchange of political favors for money or other forms of compensations ? This is already illegal. It's generally termed "corruption".
    • norswap 8y ago
      I guess you could say lobbying legalizes a portion of what is understood as corruption. (Not everything, obviously.) Under the guise of "defending special interests", or something similar. You shouldn't be allowed to finance people whose decision you stand to profit from. I guess the only "simple" way to solve this is to outlaw the private financing of politicians and their campaign. It should all be public money. Not that easy to operationalize (almost nothing of interest is), but feasible, desirable and fair I reckon.
• trhway 8y ago
  >it should be illegal for you to air your grievances to elected officials? Doing it for money - yes, that should be illegal.
  • mikestew 8y ago
    You mean acting as a paid representative on someone else's behalf to stand before a government official? Isn't that what lawyers do?
    • hjanssen 8y ago
      What are you trying to say with that?
      • mikestew 8y ago
        I'm saying that "airing grievances" "for money" has prior art. I'm a busy person, and the opinion stated says that it should be illegal for me to hire a person to represent my views before, say, a congressperson. Or it should be illegal to hire a person more eloquent than myself to state my case; a professional, as it were. We hire lawyers because navigating the law is difficult. Should we not also be allowed to hire professionals as we take part in the making of those same laws?
        • hjanssen 8y ago
          I still fail to see your point. A lobbyist still has a fundamentally different job than a lawyer, and they both use fundamentally different tactics to reach fundamentally different goals.
          • pathseeker 8y ago
            They don't have fundamentally different jobs. They are there to represent their clients' interests and advocate for them.
• curiousgal 8y ago
  > unconstitutional God forbid we think outside the realm of what the Founding Fathers wrote down. > fly directly in the face of democracy Except the U.S. has long been classified as a flawed democracy. The problems you list can "simply" be solved with a comission akin to the FTC. A small business can complain to said comission which would solve the matter.
  • jki275 8y ago
    The US isn't a "flawed democracy", it's intentionally not a democracy.
    • anth_anm 8y ago
      The US is a democracy. It's not a direct democracy. it's flawed because the system is outdated and broken. It was a system designed to consolidate power among white landowners and to be extremely difficult to change. It's not a surprise it's got issues.
      • jki275 8y ago
        The US is a Representative Republic, which differs from a democracy in several significant ways. It was designed to be difficult to change because democracies always fail when the majority decides the rule of law is no longer important.
        • anth_anm 8y ago
          A democracy and a republican are not mutually exclusive. The US is a democracy.
          • jki275 8y ago
            A representative republic is the system we have in the US, which is by definition not a democracy. They're two very different concepts, and they are mutually exclusive. This is basic civics. It's taught, or I hope it's still taught, in grade school. It's not controversial, it's not surprising, it's fact.
• undecisive 8y ago
  Aside from the fact that many countries have ways of limiting lobbyist influence through law, a simple but dramatic way would be to say: 0. Lobbying is a right, but one that can only be exercised by individual citizens, not corporations. 1. Anyone who wishes to "lobby" congressional candidates or congresspersons must register their financial interests 2. Make it illegal to directly accept money for lobbying services (akin to prostitution) Sure, it wouldn't make lobbying impossible - but it would make it much harder.
  • naasking 8y ago
    > 0. Lobbying is a right, but one that can only be exercised by individual citizens, not corporations. So charities and environmental groups can't lobby? Lobbying for them means designating a representative. How is that any different from what corporations are doing? They just happen to have deeper pockets. Furthermore, the fact that they have deep pockets is actually important. It means they reflect an important aspect of the economy, so ignoring their interests could also have detrimental economic effects. It's not nearly as simple as you're portraying.
    • ergothus 8y ago
      > Furthermore, the fact that they have deep pockets is actually important. It means they reflect an important aspect of the economy, so ignoring their interests could also have detrimental economic effects. This embeds the idea that someone making more money has a right to a larger voice than someone that doesn't. - In my "if the world were simple" dreams I'd say something like "every voter can spend $200 - any lobbying group or corp can spend that $200 IN THEIR NAME, but then no one else, including that voter, can. Corps/groups can still raise money and represent their members (who don't have to each spend that money) but it doesn't make a small group of wealthy voters look like a big group of voters. The groups/corps would have to make sure they represented the views of their members, or those members would start revoking their permissions." Of course, the world isn't that simple, but that sums up my views on money in politics.
      • pathseeker 8y ago
• hcnews 8y ago
  > When you think there are simple answers to big problems it's generally because you don't actually understand the problem. Funny. Most complex problems have simple solutions. It takes lot more effort to do it, but the simple solutions tend to stick around the longest. This is based on 10 years of work exp in top tech companies :-) The only place when simple solutions don't work is when people have other vested interests.
  • tomnipotent 8y ago
    > Most complex problems have simple solutions This trope is both untrue and tired, as most cookie-cutter generalities are.
  • isostatic 8y ago
    For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.
• smokeyj 8y ago
  > When you think there are simple answers to big problems it's generally because you don't actually understand the problem. Or it's pretty obvious and some people are intentionally dense. For example, why are people still being imprisoned for possessing a harmless plant like marijuana? Colorado showed some "complex issues best left to the adults" are a societal level fabrication rooted in ignorance and fear. People who claim an idea is too complex to comprehend almost never comprehend the idea. > How would you outlaw lobbyists? "Regulation" > What about a small business that is being unfairly impacted by regulations What about them? Are they going to buy some high powered lobbyists with their small town budget?? That's the whole point. Lobbying unfairly distorts regulation.
  • throwawaymath 8y ago
    > Or it's pretty obvious and some people are intentionally dense. It doesn't seem at all obvious to me how you would outlaw lobbying - in general or by specific types of companies. Do you think I'm being intentionally dense? Maybe most large problems aren't actually trivial, and the reason they don't get solved by message board suggestions is because those suggestions wouldn't work. Just a thought. If you disagree, why don't you walk me through your proposal in a less handwavey manner. The devil is in the details - surely you can agree that there are a variety of challenges at each step of the way?
    • smokeyj 8y ago
      > If you disagree, why don't you walk me through your proposal in a less handwavey manner You could say companies aren't allowed to spend money to intentionally target or influence elected representatives. Sure it's hardly defined at all, and maybe I spent 30 seconds on it. But if a jury of my peers unanimously think an exec was trying to influence a representative, then why not levy a huge fine? As far as the legality, is there anything interstate commerce doesn't encompass?
• kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
  Just outlaw legislation written by lobbyists. If Congressmen have to do the actual work of writing, it would end up being simpler than the specially crafted 500pg bills nobody reads. It isn't too much to ask elected officials to do the work they signed up for.
  • Xixi 8y ago
    What you are saying is quite interesting: basically if lawmakers need to have the skill of writing laws, then it means that they must be very educated in law matters. Lawyers, basically, which makes a lot of sense. But on the other hand if you restrict congressmanship (is that a word?) to such a small and biased sample of the population, how are they supposed to understand the actual problems of the population at large? It is the very problem of representative democracy: elected officials need to form an elite of superior intelligence and ability to comprehend the world, yet at the same time be firmly grounded in the reality of everyday people to understand their problems and represent them...
    • throwaway190102 8y ago
      >elected officials need to form an elite of superior intelligence and ability to comprehend the world This is much less of a problem if you can hold down scope-creep on the role and responsibilities of government.
  • ksdale 8y ago
    Something that stuck with me from law school was that frequently when students raised the point that a law could be written far more simply, the professor would walk through the language they suggested and basically always the simplest formulation was absolutely shot through with loopholes, and as you close the obvious loopholes one by one, you end up with language that looks just like the statute as written, or you end up with a law that doesn’t accomplish the same thing.