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Larry Lessig: I'm All In

theatlantic.com

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Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#31

Post by crdoconnor »

AlwaysBCoding wrote: post #27
enjo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think of a startup whose founders spent 70% of their time raising money, they would never get anything done. That's a bad example. For even a relatively early stage startup, raising money is the actual job description for a typical startup CEO. They probably spend more than 70% of their time on it. It doesn't invalidate your point at all, however. Lawmakers are not startup CEO's. By providing every incentive to simpl…

yeah like a five person team who's CEO spends 70% of time fundraising is probably fine. But an ENTIRE team that spends 70% of their time fundraising perpetually would be about as effective as Congress actually is.

Congresspeople have staffers who do not fundraise.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#32

Post by JumpCrisscross »

solipsism wrote: post #24
javajosh wrote: post #14

I feel sad because I'm probably Lessig's ideal target audience, but I don't like any of this. I don't like that he backed down so quickly from his first approach, because of the polls. Isn't that what corrupt politicians do? I don't like that he is so vague about what he's going to do to fix corruption - I get it that it's about taking money out of politics, but how do you get there, especially when Congress is seize…

I don't like that he is so vague about what he's going to do to fix corruption - I get it that it's about taking money out of politics, but how do you get there, especially when Congress is seized up? If he were to be elected he would have a very strong mandate to fight for the reforms he proposes -- a strong enough mandate that Congress might be forced to adhere to it. If the people put Lessig in the Presidency it's…

> If he were to be elected he would have a very strong mandate to fight for the reforms he proposes -- a strong enough mandate that Congress might be forced to adhere to it... A Democratic congressperson or senator who voted against such reforms would surely be risking his/her job.

Note peoples' diverging approval ratings between Congress as a whole and their own Congresspersons. Each Congressperson could find a local reason to nitpick over, and thus vote against, a measure they and the country broadly support.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#33

Post by keypusher »

javajosh wrote: post #14

I feel sad because I'm probably Lessig's ideal target audience, but I don't like any of this. I don't like that he backed down so quickly from his first approach, because of the polls. Isn't that what corrupt politicians do? I don't like that he is so vague about what he's going to do to fix corruption - I get it that it's about taking money out of politics, but how do you get there, especially when Congress is seize…

Did you actually watch the Democratic debate a few days ago? Because almost every issue you raise was discussed there. Climate change, torture, surveillance, accountability, police violence, as well as thing like education reform.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#34

Post by jules »

djhn wrote: post #21
AlwaysBCoding wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is though, Lessig is completely right. Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money. They're not lawmakers, they're professional fundraisers. Think of a startup whose founders spent 70% of their time raising money, they would never get anything done. And since fundraising is now such an integral part of a Congressman's day to day, they have two classes of constitutes to think about: the voters,…

> Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money. They're not lawmakers, they're professional fundraisers. > they would never get anything done You will have a hard time convincing HN that what US needs are more laws, especially at a rate limited by time available to politicians for writing them! Broadly speaking limits on campaign donations are fairly small (Max $5k) and average donation sums ($100-200) a…

The $5k limit is irrelevant. PACs can funnel an unlimited amount of money into campaigns as long as they are "independent". Besides, average Joe certainly does not even have $5k to spend on a campaign, so yea if it were true that the $5k limit is relevant then the politician would have to reach out to thousands of rich people. But even that isn't true.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#36

Post by solipsism »

I think Lessig should reinstate his promise to resign after passing the Citizen Equality Act, run as an independent, and pick a good conservative to be his running mate. The corruption of democracy by special interests is not only a Democratic issue. Hell, it's one of the Tea Party's Core Beliefs.

This would get him more attention, it would get some conservatives voting for him, and it would get some some progressives voting for him. As a progressive, I'd accept a term with a conservative president if it meant taking a huge step to fix the system as a whole.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#37

Post by djhn »

AlwaysBCoding wrote: post #26
djhn wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money. They're not lawmakers, they're professional fundraisers. > they would never get anything done You will have a hard time convincing HN that what US needs are more laws, especially at a rate limited by time available to politicians for writing them! Broadly speaking limits on campaign donations are fairly small (Max $5k) and average donation sums ($100-200) a…

The "limit" on campaign donations is a complete farce though. Let's look at Jeb Bush. Jeb stated multiple times that he wasn't running for president in 2016, and instead started a Super PAC that let him raise uncapped campaign donations, and ultimately raised over $100 million. Then he announces that he had a change of heart, was indeed going to run for president, and gave control of his Super PAC to a friend of his.…

Yes, SuperPACs and presidential races are another beast altogether. Like I said, I was talking about a general case, since you referred to legislators, which by definition excludes presidential candidates.

SuperPACs are difficult to play the devil's advocate for. They are a feature of running a widespread democratic campaign in a big country, where the ad impressions on voters are prohibitively expensive because of said voters purchasing power.

SuperPACs have very lax limits on contribution, but they need to be firewalled from the main campaign and cannot coordinate spending, and their power to target their spending is very limited. As far as I can tell, this firewall is as good as any such structure required by law and audited (e.g. finance, consulting, etc.). That is to say, it works okay, but not great.

Full disclosure, I am involved in campaigning professionally (not US) and was an independent OSCE observer of the 2012 presidential elections in the US when working for my country's parliament.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#38

Post by chillwaves »

jules wrote: post #34
djhn wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money. They're not lawmakers, they're professional fundraisers. > they would never get anything done You will have a hard time convincing HN that what US needs are more laws, especially at a rate limited by time available to politicians for writing them! Broadly speaking limits on campaign donations are fairly small (Max $5k) and average donation sums ($100-200) a…

The $5k limit is irrelevant. PACs can funnel an unlimited amount of money into campaigns as long as they are "independent". Besides, average Joe certainly does not even have $5k to spend on a campaign, so yea if it were true that the $5k limit is relevant then the politician would have to reach out to thousands of rich people. But even that isn't true.

The government should issue everyone $5k to spend on politics (and only politics), then it would be democratic.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#39

Post by jensen123 »

AlwaysBCoding wrote: post #5
jacobolus wrote: post #2

> But it weakened the credibility of the campaign. Was I really trying to be president? Or was I just trying to make a point? Obvious answer: he’s just trying to make a point, the whole thing is a publicity stunt, and his campaign has never had and still does not have any credibility whatsoever. > But the result was almost no national media focused on a campaign that was actually more viable than that of at least two…

The thing is though, Lessig is completely right. Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money. They're not lawmakers, they're professional fundraisers. Think of a startup whose founders spent 70% of their time raising money, they would never get anything done. And since fundraising is now such an integral part of a Congressman's day to day, they have two classes of constitutes to think about: the voters,…

> Members of Congress spend 70% of their time raising money.

Why do they do this? Because the politicians who spend the most money on advertising generally win the elections, right? I'm wondering if what we're seeing here is the failure of democracy with universal suffrage. Most of the voters don't seem to be independent thinkers. They could have voted for politicians who haven't been "bought". But they don't. For example, there are other political parties out there - Green Party, Libertarian Party etc., but almost nobody votes for those.

Re: Larry Lessig: I'm All In

#40

Post by fyolnish »

chillwaves wrote: post #38
jules wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The $5k limit is irrelevant. PACs can funnel an unlimited amount of money into campaigns as long as they are "independent". Besides, average Joe certainly does not even have $5k to spend on a campaign, so yea if it were true that the $5k limit is relevant then the politician would have to reach out to thousands of rich people. But even that isn't true.

The government should issue everyone $5k to spend on politics (and only politics), then it would be democratic.

That's just voting
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