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Two SOPA Writers Become Entertainment Lobbyists
schwit1 writes "According to Politico, 'A pair of senior Hill aides at the center of a brewing battle between Hollywood and Silicon Valley are packing their bags for K Street, where they’ll work for two of the entertainment lobby shops trying to influence their former colleagues in Congress on the very same issue. Allison Halataei, former deputy chief of staff and parliamentarian to House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), and Lauren Pastarnack, a Republican who has served as a senior aide on the Senate Judiciary Committee, worked on online piracy bills that would push Internet companies like Google, Yahoo and Facebook to shut down websites that offer illegal copies of blockbuster films and chart-topping songs.' Techdirt adds, 'Pastarnack went to the MPAA where she'll be "director of government relations" and Halataei to the NMPA (music publishers and songwriters) where she'll be "chief liaison to Capitol Hill." The Politico article linked above notes that this kind of "revolving door" is all too common. It may not be directly corrupt, but to the public it sure feels corrupt.'"
It's way to easy to "encourage" someone to write bills in your favor as a company. And politicians wonder why so many people don't even bother to vote anymore.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
...that "sopa" means "trash" in Swedish? :)
And politicians wonder why they get less respect than the IRS.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
The Politico article only states that this act is completely legal, not that it isn't directly corrupt. There's a difference between the two.
Directed by money.
United States of America, the best government money can buy.
I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightning.
It may not be directly corrupt, but to the public it sure feels corrupt.'"
Incorrect. This is an inherently corrupt practice, much like when Michael Moore pointed out (in the film Sicko) that the politicians who supported the big medical corporations at the expense of health care also got executive level positions after their corrupt legislation was approved by congress.
I will correct the quote:
It may not be directly illegal, but to the public it is corrupt.'
how many more times do you need to be shown that business' ability to regulate government is only a way to steal and sell power?
ftfy
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
This should be the sole focus of the Occupy movement: a law that makes it illegal to engage in any business with the private industry which you have recently helped regulate, for a period of 10 years. Additionally, make it a law that you cannot regulate an industry where you have worked in the previous ten years. (This includes voting in the chamber: it's called a conflict of interest for a reason.) Make the conviction penalty for lawmakers their immediate termination and a complete dissolution of their government pension.
When people complain that the only way it would work is if government had to disclose all of their now-private meetings, you say, "You're damn right they would." When they say that half of Congress couldn't vote because they're lawyers, you say, "You're damn right they couldn't." That, of course, is the whole problem: we've got hundreds of millionaire lawyers pretending that they care about working class Americans. But instead, they're taking away our rights and giving them to corporations who put money in their campaign coffers.
I don't want any more secret meetings between the companies picking my pocket and the government I pay to employ. No more Vegas style parties on the taxpayer dime. No more loopholes for outrageously wealthy corporations shipping our livelihoods overseas so they can rake in profits while we bail them out. Openly perform your duties as a public servant, or get the hell out of our government.
First, in some countries this would automatically spark an ethics investigation or be deemed corrupt. It may not be "corrupt" in the US, but I suspect that's more of a relative definition of corrupt than an absolute one.
Second, the US is ranked 24th in the world on corruption. I'd therefore argue that the standards the US government holds itself to is not only nowhere near what it could be, but isn't even anywhere near as good as other nations are managing on a day-to-day basis. This isn't great for smaller nations, though you can understand that they don't have the resources to be equal and of high quality. They also don't have much influence and the impact of corruption is necessarily limited. A fair number are also very new and don't have much experience. A nation like the US is a different matter. They've plenty of resources, they've had three centuries to work out the flaws, and they've far too much power to not be responsible with it.
The fact that New Zealand, Denmark and Finland are first and joint second respectively (none of whom are permanent members of the UN Security Council, hold nuclear weapons, dominate either the IMF or World Bank, or control vast swathes of international trade) is worthy of great respect. They don't have to be as good as they are, they just are because they by-and-large want to be. Not saying they're perfect, this is a ranking system not a measure against a fixed standard, but it is highly commendable none-the-less.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Just an idea...
Occupy The Pirate Bay.
Someone creates a text file that embodies the disgust and derision of the masses towards SOPA (and all that it represents), then uploads this file to TPB. Everyone that feels sympathetic to the contents of the file can then download it and seed it. The idea is to get a running total of seeds as high as possible--a petition, if you will. Those numbers--seeds and peers--can then be used as an argument against SOPA (or anything like it). Perhaps a "declaration of consumer rights" as we consumers would create one...
I'd love to see such a thing at the top of TPB listings.
Now that I think about this, perhaps such an idea could be used to nominate actual laws and bills for consideration by governments.
60 Minutes: Jack Abramoff on Lobbying and Gov Corruption http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMMppBhOLXA
Despite the title, it's only 15 minutes long. And certainly worth watching!