But escalate pressure how? Again, assuming that the votes do stay private, how will the leaders know who is lying to them and whom to pressure? Would there be 1

But escalate pressure how? Again, assuming that the votes do stay private, how will the leaders know who is lying to them and whom to pressure? Would there be 1 senator pressuring the other 50 to make it pass? But what if it still doesn't pass, does the 1 senator need to pressure all 99 others to try to guarantee it'll pass? If it still doesn't pass, does the 1 senator say we need to sack all 99 of the others? I agree the general belief is that lobbyists pay politicians to buy votes. I think lobbyists pay much more money to intimidate politicians to vote in certain directions, as it's much cheaper to threaten 100 by paying to make an example of 1, than to pay 100 directly. So yes, I think they would try to intimidate them, I just don't see how it would actually happen. Perhaps the lobbyists would punish all, just as the teacher punishes the whole class when no one will admit to pulling the prank, or the coach punishes the whole team when no one takes responsibility for a mistake. I just think that for lobbyists to punish the whole team of 100 senators and 435 members of Congress would require a lot more money and would be harder to coordinate than it currently is. Increase the numbers of senators or members of Congress and that could become even more difficult. I'm not saying it's not possible, it just seems significantly more difficult to intimidate when these details are secret.