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> In DraftKing’s case, Robins realized he had a relationships problem. DraftKings had no relationships with lawmakers, which meant no open dialog or opportunity
by ajkjk 3y ago
> In DraftKing’s case, Robins realized he had a relationships problem. DraftKings had no relationships with lawmakers, which meant no open dialog or opportunity to create common ground. So they invested in lobbyists, started meeting with local officials, and ultimately helped craft laws that made lawmakers happy but kept DraftKings in business.
Ah yes. "Here's a tip to make the world worse."
Not that they're wrong, but that's such a disappointing example.
- controlledchaos 3y agoYeah, I was just about to re-share this until I read that.
- mandmandam 3y agoPretending horrible bastards aren't 'lobbying' isn't going to fix the problem. The one-word problem here could be 'lobbyists' or 'lawmakers' or 'bribery' or 'exploitation'. It could even be just as the article said: 'relationships'... But it sure isn't this article, written after the fact, with no hint of actually condoning said behavior other than failing to pass moral judgment. If you think about it some more, you might be glad that the author reminded us about this. Our lawmakers sell us out to fossil fuels, big banks, corporate media, telecomms, polluters, etc, and then tell us it's raining.
- vegetablepotpie 3y agoAll the while, normal well adjusted people, don’t want to get “political” but wealthy special interests are happy to “open dialogs” and “find common ground” with elected officials we elect once every two years. Democracy is hard. If participation is limited to voting in an election, the public interest will be ignored.
- Qwertious 3y agoBeing able to participate more with money disproportionately benefits the rich.
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago> Being able to participate more with money disproportionately benefits the rich. Fully true. The public is relegated to - at best - a veto vote on corruption, which they rarely use (and are rarely informed as to why they should. Thanks press!).
- raincole 3y agoI personally think it's the only bit that makes this article worth reading. Instead of fantasizing a creative, insightful and genius solution, it shows a glimpse of how the real business world works.
- rolandog 3y agoKind of like those "small boy sells limonade so his bed-ridden father can buy artificially expensive treatment" articles that are meant to showcase community, but actually show the heartlessness of insurance and medical for-profit companies?
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y agoPlease explain how that makes the world worse. Everyone likes to rant about lobbyists and lobbying, which are strange names for something Thomas Jefferson chose instead to call "petitioning government for redress of grievances". Is it that you just dislike it when other people exercise their rights? Is it that you don't bother to exercise those same rights yourself, and so they shouldn't be allowed to do so either? Or maybe it's just that they're better at it and that seems unfair to you?
- irrational 3y agoIs gambling a grievance? There are lots of things the government rightly doesn’t let us do, or, strongly discourages us from doing, because they are bad for us. Of course, this is the same government that supports gambling in the form of the lottery, so clearly they don’t have people’s best interests in mind.
- hammock 3y agoMy uncle, who is disabled, made $10000 in Vegas last month. My second cousin won the lottery 7 years ago and bought emission-free vehicles for her entire family. Was gambling bad for them?
- ajkjk 3y agoAs you are no doubt aware, if you're evaluating if a thing is good or bad you have to consider its net effect, not a couple isolated examples. This is just a "smoking feels good and well I didn't get lung cancer" argument.
- hammock 3y agoMy uncle plays at the Mirage, so excess profits benefit a forgotten community (the Seminole tribe) that was historically and brutally marginalized by the privileged ‘society’ whose net effect you are considering. The lottery proceeds fund public schools.
- nottorp 3y agoHe had a 'not bribing the right people' problem? Seems to be called lobbying in the US.
- alakin 3y agoPretty much everywhere else they pretend to not have lobbying or bribing, but just end up doing it behind closed doors.
- nottorp 3y agoIt may be a program to create jobs. I mean, there would be no lobbyist profession if the lawmakers would take the bribes directly.
- BSEdlMMldESB 3y agoabsolutely: a very pragmatic approach to "solving" the corruption problem. Let's call it lobbying and make it legal and legitimate
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago> Let's call it lobbying and make it legal and legitimate And we can keep the overt cash payouts. We just launder the funds thru campaign chests and revolving-door, high salaried jobs (as a lobbyist, consultant, etc).
- plagiarist 3y agoIt's only natural that the campaign purchase several million copies of your self-published book to give out to influence voters! And of course the campaign should hire your brother-in-law's ad firm, you already know what their quality is like!
- Mimmy 3y agoAgreed, what a way to sour a decent message with an awful example. > Government, acting in the best interest of their citizens, were trying to curb an addictive substance. CEO of generic tobacco / drug / oil / gambling company, realizing that this would hurt their profits, decided that the best way forward was to effectively bribe those in power to put their company's profits over the well-being of society. If this is true, I'd like to thank the author for inadvertently pointing out the real source of the sports gambling problem: people like Jason Robins. We don't have a sports gambling problem, we have a greedy CEO bribing lawmakers problem.
- tilne 3y agoI don’t disagree with the sentiment, but I disagree that Robins is to blame. If the system enables this kind of behavior, there will always be someone willing to take advantage. If not Robins, then the next shameless profiteer.
- acegopher 3y agoJust because you can, doesn't mean you should. Not everything that isn't illegal is ethical.
- plufz 3y agoI dont disagree that the main problem is systemic/political but all systems have flaws, people should always have a higher moral standard than simply following the law. Robins is to blame but not alone.
- keiferski 3y agoAll this indicates is that the problem is at the system level. It doesn’t mean the actor is somehow less culpable just because “someone else would have done it anyway.”
- LoFiSamurai 3y agoCorrect. There are also plenty of people who realize that while things are possible within a system, they choose not to do them for moral / ethical reasons.
- riazrizvi 3y agoLobbying is cause promoting. You look for invested parties and plead your side. It’s fundamental to running society where groups want representation. I think you’re mixing lobbying with bribery. Bribery is illegal.
- slivanes 3y agoNo, lobbying becomes bribery when money or favors exchanges hands.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sarchertech 3y agoIf money actually goes to the candidate instead of the campaign to re-elect the candidate, it is literally bribery and is illegal.
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago> If money actually goes to the candidate instead of the campaign to re-elect the candidate, it is literally bribery and is illegal. True. Also if the money enriches the candidate thru means other than cash-in-hand, the bribery may be legal and is just as unethical.
- Qwertious 3y ago>It’s fundamental to running society where groups want representation. Groups which don't have a lot of people in them, but do have a lot of money, and can't find anyone willing to voluntarily advocate for them. Bribery ought to be illegal, but in practice it's legal - e.g. corporate donations.
- riazrizvi 3y agoUsing saved up money to execute your agenda is a fundamental feature of civilized society. Before money, basic transactions had to have goods exchanged on the spot. Money is a simple debt agreement that has been written in a commoditized form so that the creditor can easily trade it at their convenience, with other parties who can delay their dues for longer. It is just commoditized social obligation. Some people have a lot of it, because in their or their ancestors past, they racked up a lot of social obligation. It’s still just people who are due favors, calling them in.
- rocqua 3y agoReading the text literally, it just says that the CEO opened a dialog that helped pick laws the lawmakers liked but didn't harm draftkings. Lawmakers consulting with people with experience in what they are trying to regulate is generally a good thing. There is a reading of this story where draftkings helped lawmakers make better laws. It doesn't take much sceptisism to read it differently admitedly, but the plain text doesn't state that.
- wwweston 3y agoPeople who engage lawmakers and public officials have a chance of shaping policy. Doing so is using the system as it's designed, so unless you have some specific criticism about the legitimacy of policy that came out of that engagement, it's not really clear to me how you could make a reasonable claim that will "make the world worse." Generally speaking, the major problem isn't that some people do this (though some do in bad faith). The larger problem is that most people don't (and even fewer do so as concrete problem solvers).
- nuancebydefault 3y agoWait a minute... "made lawmakers happy" was said. Let's delve into this "problem" of addictive behavior and think about root-cause-problems. - people are unhappy in their lives and fall into addiction * they have too many opportunities for abuse * there's something really wrong in their lives that needs solving - lawmakers fail to make laws that reduce addiction * lawmakers are persuaded by lobbyists that act for profit, because the latter have good arguments or the former are easy to convince/bribe * they don't understand addiction because they are ill positioned for that job Above can be broken down further into core problems, that should be tackled. My point being, it's not necessarily a bad example.