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'The Laws Are Written By Lobbyists,' Says Google's Schmidt

Posted by Soulskill on from the bought-and-paid-for dept.

An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from The Atlantic: "'The average American doesn't realize how much of the laws are written by lobbyists' to protect incumbent interests, Google CEO Eric Schmidt told Atlantic editor James Bennet at the Washington Ideas Forum. 'It's shocking how the system actually works.' In a wide-ranging interview that spanned human nature, the future of machines, and how Google could have helped the stimulus, Schmidt said technology could 'completely change the way government works.' 'Washington is an incumbent protection machine,' Schmidt said. 'Technology is fundamentally disruptive.' Mobile phones and personal technology, for example, could be used to record the bills that members of Congress actually read and then determine what stimulus funds were successfully spent." We discussed a specific example of this from the cable industry back in August.

4 of 484 comments (clear)

  1. Rambling bunch of Duhs! by Shivetya · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Oh, I WTFV, but still, like there have been other oracles before him, it matters not. Technology has change government, it has given it more methods to keep people in line, to feed them what they want, to play one class off another, to better mince boundary lines to keep officials in power, to better redistribute wealth to do what boundaries cannot, and a host of other abuses. We have all the fun of McCain/Feingold followed by an Administration that seems to have free speech if it is of a differing opinion. One that takes the worst of the previous abuser and exaggerates them.

    China operates like the Orwellian nightmare of a business, uprooting people and destroying history and nature in its relentless march forward, hoping to get where its going before something irrevocably breaks. China has to look over its shoulder as well, up and coming countries arise all the time, each more hungry than the last. Let alone their real problem, how to keep North Korea from causing an all out war next door.

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    * Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
    1. Re:Rambling bunch of Duhs! by biryokumaru · · Score: 4, Interesting

      That's actually a misconception. Oil from "Persian Gulf" countries only accounts for 17% of foreign oil consumption, which is a mere 51% (same link) of our total oil usage, which is only 59% (Liquids + Natural Gas) of our total energy consumption. That makes Persian Gulf oil a mere 5% of our total energy usage. Our Nuclear usage is more than that (8%, second link), and everyone knows we hate Nuclear in the US.

      The connection between our interests in the middle east and our oil needs is tenuous at best. What we really need the balls to do is build more Nuclear plants. Here China is again a great example, with 23 new reactors presently under construction.

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      When you're afraid to download music illegally in your own home, then the terrorists have won!
  2. The scale is the problem by rantomaniac · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I suspect it's simply impossible to create a non-corrupt government that manages a country that big and is so far removed from its citizens. Going back to the roots and organizing ourselves into something akin to city-states might allow us to keep closer control over the people we designate.
    Diversity of laws can be a problem, but at least nowadays with online communications it'd be easier for such city-states to cooperate on treaties.
    A question that arises is whether it wouldn't actually empower corporations more, with smaller states having smaller budgets than industry leaders.

  3. Re:Not news by commodore64_love · · Score: 4, Interesting

    >>>T-minus 14 years.

    Maybe the 50 Member States should call a constitutional convention before that happens, and add a few amendments such as "Corporations do not have the same rights as the People." ALSO: "When one-half of the Legislatures of the Member States declare a Law unconstitutional, it shall be null and void from the moment of its enactment."

    AND: "The task of examining Laws and determining constitutionality shall reside in a Constitutional Court, independent of the United States, whose 7 justices shall serve for 20 years, and be chusen by the Governors of the States by simple majority ballot. They shall have power to overturn or affirm cases previously examined by the Supreme Court." AND: "Strike the clause 'and general Welfare'."

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    *The typical SCOTUS judge serves 29 years. I consider that too long, so I made it two-thirds that length.

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    "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall