Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law • Hacker News Board

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#41

Post by Fezzik » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 6:02 PM UTC

geofft wrote: post #37

rayiner wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it’s not true. It’s a falsehood perpetuated by people who seek to delegitimize the status quo. You pay people to make PowerPoint presentations about the proposed legislation. (And create talking points and white papers and that sort of thing. A lot of it is just arming legislators with data and arguments to support positions they support anyway.)

In many cases you're paying people to create the text of the laws themselves. Also, how is "paying people to make PowerPoint presentations and talking points about proposed legislation so that legislators can be convinced that a certain law should be passed" not just a form of "paying to pass a certain law"? When I set out to write complex software, I generally collect data, make arguments, write design docs / white…

The entire legislature still has to vote on the law though, and lobbyists are never meeting with all, or even more than a few, specific representatives. I would say a much bigger problem is the towing of the party line - whatever senior members propose, junior members vote for, else they risk being ousted from their party.

Also, I have always found the blaming of lobbyists odd: I am confused by the blaming of lobbyists for presenting their agenda to a legislator, who then promotes that agenda, leading to the passing of a law that is pro-that-agenda. I would place all the blame on the legislators. It’s like, if I approach my boss and ask for excessive raises over and over, and wine and dine her, and then I keep getting those raises, should my co-workers be far more mad at me or my boss? It seems to me it is my boss’s fault for giving the raise, as she holds all the real power, not my fault for asking. She has the duty to decline if the request is improper. I do not believe I have a duty to not make my case, despite probably being scummy. What I am doing may be frowned upon, but if my boss is swayed by a few compliments and a donation to her charity of choice, she probably should not be the boss. The same goes for legislators - stop voting for the dummies with no scruples, and stop thinking it is the fault of anyone other than the people who actually vote for these hypothetical bills that result in so many one-sided, pro one-company-or-religion-or-whateveror, awful laws.

I personally feel lobbyists are scummy, but I fail to see them as blameworthy in regards to the laws we actually end up with.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#42

Post by Despegar » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 6:33 PM UTC

Microsoft could have thrown their lot in with Apple, but I guess they're going to look more like the ad-tech giants than Apple and need to preserve the status quo.

Apple should assemble a separate coalition of businesses that would lean just as hard as the ad-tech coalition in favor of privacy in all these state legislatures. I'm pretty sure most enterprise SaaS companies that charge money for their product would have similar interests.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#43

Post by tzs » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 6:39 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #23

rayiner wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. Microsoft is a major employer in Washington. Not to mention, it’s one of the nation’s major innovators, making products everyone uses. It’s views on proposed legislation are extremely relevant and helpful and it’s in the “public interest” for legislators to consider them. Note that some of the provisions in questio…

Mocrosoft’s views on legislation are already throughly represented through the voting power of its shareholders, employees, and anyone else who is affected by them. Are you saying they should have unequal influence beyond that?

Huh? As a subscriber to Office 365, Microsoft has sensitive information about me, and so I am affected by Microsoft's handling of privacy and data security.

How does that make my voting power representative of their views?

I also question whether a company's views are represented through the voting power of its employees.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#44

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:25 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #27

JohnFen wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their interests are highly aligned. It sure doesn't seem like it to me. Corporations are about maximizing profits, which in part means soaking people to greatest degree possible. It would be easier to support the notion that their interests are "highly aligned" if corporations had an incentive to make a reasonable profit rather than the most profit they can get away with.

Corporations make a profit by giving people what the people want. Apple makes tons of profits because it innovates and gives people products they love. Same thing for Walmart and Amazon. (It turns out that what people love is cheap crap delivered instantly, but that is what it is.) Same thing for Exxon. (People love cheap gas so they can drive their SUVs to Chipotle and Exxon delivers that.) It’s entities that don’t…

> Corporations make a profit by giving people what the people want.

In part. In part, they make a profit by engaging in activities that nobody outside of corporations want, up to and including things that are harmful to society (and business) as a whole. The larger the corporation, it seems, the more of their profit comes from the latter.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#45

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:27 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #21

JohnFen wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And making large donations to reelection campaigns.

That’s just not true. To the extent lobbyists make donations, they do so in their individual, rather than representative capacity. Look at open secrets’ list of top lobbyists: https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/top.php?indexType=lb&showY... . They’re not making “large donations.” Some of the top lobbyists contributed nothing. Most a few hundred to a few thousand, which is not out of line for DC residents in that econo…

PACs and SuperPACs are donations made for lobbying purposes. Individual lobbyists may not fork over money, but any real lobbying campaign overall does.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#46

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:40 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #32

skrebbel wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think much of Europe is looking at the US that way. It's mind blowing, especially how much it happens in the open. We have lots of corruption too, but it's mostly hidden and if it gets out it's a scandal. In the US it appears to be just normal matter of fact stuff. Company funds politician; politician gets elected; favourable law gets passed; nobody bats an eye.

Much of Europe must be very ignorant about American law then, because it is illegal here for companies to fund the election campaigns of candidates.

This is only kinda true. It's illegal for companies to fund the election campaigns of candidates above a certain dollar amount -- unless it's done the right way.

Our system appears quite corrupt when it comes to bribery. That there are so many legal ways to do it (and not call it bribery) only underscores that.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#47

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:43 PM UTC

Fezzik wrote: post #41

geofft wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In many cases you're paying people to create the text of the laws themselves. Also, how is "paying people to make PowerPoint presentations and talking points about proposed legislation so that legislators can be convinced that a certain law should be passed" not just a form of "paying to pass a certain law"? When I set out to write complex software, I generally collect data, make arguments, write design docs / white…

The entire legislature still has to vote on the law though, and lobbyists are never meeting with all, or even more than a few, specific representatives. I would say a much bigger problem is the towing of the party line - whatever senior members propose, junior members vote for, else they risk being ousted from their party. Also, I have always found the blaming of lobbyists odd: I am confused by the blaming of lobbyis…

> I have always found the blaming of lobbyists odd

I think most people consider lobbying a serious problem because of the power discrepancy involved. You and I can't effectively lobby. The entities that can tend to be the ones who are already inordinately powerful. The result is that lobbying overall tends to disenfranchise ordinary citizens. It is inherently corrosive to our system of government.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#48

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:51 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #24

mikeash wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mocrosoft’s views on legislation are already throughly represented through the voting power of its shareholders, employees, and anyone else who is affected by them. Are you saying they should have unequal influence beyond that?

The right to participate in a democracy isn’t limited to voting. The first amendment guarantees the right to “petition the government for a redress of grievances.” The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights contains a similar provision. If the government proposes to build a highway through my town, I can go meet with a legislator and express my disapproval. (And people do stuff like that all the time.) I’m not limited to j…

> Things that are bad for Microsoft are bad for the citizens of Washington.

Corporate lobbyists like to say things like that, but it isn't always true.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#49

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 7:53 PM UTC

sneak wrote: post #25

saagarjha wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's in the public interest for legislators to consider those views alongside the views of the general public. Unfortunately the latter does not have the resources to lobby as effectively as Microsoft does…

Let’s also remember that much of the general public (at least in the US) are MSFT shareholders, either directly or via index funds, probably as a result of retirement accounts. They aren’t mutually exclusive.

I honestly don't see the relevance of that. Most people who have such shares are not given any sort of say about what Microsoft does, so that they may have shares is not significant.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#50

Post by johnrgrace » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 11:29 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #26

rayiner wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The right to participate in a democracy isn’t limited to voting. The first amendment guarantees the right to “petition the government for a redress of grievances.” The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights contains a similar provision. If the government proposes to build a highway through my town, I can go meet with a legislator and express my disapproval. (And people do stuff like that all the time.) I’m not limited to j…

Legislators give Microsoft more weight just because of jobs? You don’t think campaign contributions play a part? And are you implying that Microsoft represents its employees when you say it represents a large and economically important group of citizens? Because it definitely does not. It pays its employees. It represents its shareholders.

My godfather was a 17 term congressman starting in the 70's, he always said for most issues there were lobbyists on both sides of the issue and if you voted how you wanted you'd get checks. When one side doesn't have money vote how you want and throw a fundraising party and invite the people you voted with.

  If you were hard up for money, you could just play at being undecided or persuadable and watch money roll in.  The biggest problem was it simply takes a lot of TIME to get money from lobbyists because they want to see your staff and sometimes you.

Much of his time in congress was pre-internet so there are two big changes 1. ability of people to see where you are getting money is a lot easier, creating a cost for teasing money out of say big oil companies. 2.Also this was before the flood of dark money, which puts pressure on needing to raise money.