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DC Revolving Door: Ex-FCC Commissioner Is Now Head CTIA Lobbyist
jfruh (300774) writes "Up until three years ago, Meredith Attwell Baker was an Obama-appointed FCC commissioner. Now she's the newly minted CEO of the CTIA, the nation's largest lobbying group for the mobile phone industry. How can we expect regulators to keep a careful watch over industries when high-paying jobs in those industries await them after retirement? One of the most damning sentences in that article: 'More than 80 percent of FCC commissioners since 1980 have gone on to work for companies or groups in the industries they used to regulate.'"
It's still a conflict of interest and ripe for quid pro quo job opportunities. Essentially, don't make our company suffer and we'll land you a lucrative job you'll be able to retire on once you leave government.
That is not the issue. The issue is if the regulator, instead of stopping abuse, let it slide for the promise of a future high paying job. In my book that is bribery, and I'm sure many people agrees with me.
This combination doesn`t exist: ETIs that know about humanity and want to see us dead. Otherwise we wouldn't exist.
What I can't put my finger on is exactly when this behavior and conflict of interest in general because fine. It's rife throughout government. We see it in a big way in the SCOTUS, and the state governments are even worse than the federal government. But *NO ONE* seems to care. This wasn't the same in the 70s and 80s, or perhaps it was and the difference is that these idiots aren't even embarrassed by it any more.
Regulator and lobbyists do not have a 'field', their skills are not related to any particular domain or technology. They could leave the FCC and go work for the farm industry and have pretty much the same transferability.
This is rewarding regulators with well paying jobs.
The current FCC Chairman was a paid lobbyist for the Telecommunications industry before he became the FCC chair....
As long as our politicians are bought and paid for, things will never change for the better.
I mean the recent issue with Verizon and the state of NJ, NJ let them off the hook for not building out the infrastructure promised in the early 90's by a mere technicality by considering heavily capped LTE as an alternative to wiring the entire state. Then stating that they would wire areas that do not have wireless service, only if 35 or more people request it.. except they know that wireless reaches every spot in NJ where there is no VZ service, so it is a cop out, they know, the PUC knows it, and how anyone in their right mind could possibly think that this is good for consumers. This only benefits the telecoms.
This is what we have in stall for our FCC chairs of the future.. not exactly this scenario, but people that would vote in a similar vein under the pretense it is good for the consumer.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
And this is one of the many reasons why the US really isn't a democracy.
if you don't want any conflict of interest. pay the agency heads $20 million a year and stipulate they are not allowed to work for any private entity for 5 years after they leave government
The conflict of interest is pretty unmistakable, here... but we have to keep in mind that even absent that conflict, this would still be the most obvious choice for both the former FCC commissioners and for the lobbying groups. The commissioners obviously have an interest in the field, and the lobbying groups would want to hire someone who knows more then a little bit about the inner workings of their "arch nemesis."
I mean... sure, moves like this will always have that sort'a greasy slimy feel to them, no matter how you cut it. But where else are they going to go?
(Plus, there's some pretty darned good scratch in going all turncoat!)
This isn't unusual, nor should it be unexpected. Regulatory agencies are there to provide advantages for the established companies over upstart competitors and their customers. The stories about working for the interests of the consumer are just what the politicians tell voters, as they take money from politically connected companies, to create bureaucracies that further the interests of those companies.
It's how a fascist (a.k.a. mercantilist, cronyist) economy works.
That's a poor-ass strawman and you know it.
This isn't about fields of expertise. This is about being beholden to specific economic interests. You can get doctors in the FDA that aren't beholden to Pfiser or Eli Lilly.
The "oh, but they are experts" is a very weak defense of corporate behavior that captures regulatory organizations.
This was going on in the 70's and 80's and before that. The difference now is we have the Internet and the 24x7 news cycle so you are actually hearing about it. It also isn't just the regulatory agencies that are in on this scam. Look how many former members of congress land at suspiciously cushy jobs after they retire. My fear is that what we have here is effectively a bribe laundering scheme. Oh yeah you do what we want and you get a nice office, important sounding title, generous salary and a big benefits package for your post Government life.
That isn't the only such scheme in place in government either. Look at politicans setting up various not for profits, charities and think tanks. That looks like outright bribe laundering. Also some of the members of congress have really suspicous investment dealings that look like outright money laundering.
The post government employment surtax by libertarian Glenn Reynolds:
50%, no deductions, no credits, just outright confiscation to ensure less profit from leveaging any potential leads from the government to win insider deals.
You are correct, she did not go directly to the CTA..
Even worse, she jumped to Comcast 3 months after pushing for the Comcast NBC merger. Bought and paid for by your tax dollars.
This was the restriction placed on her (came from wikipedia, so take with a grain of salt.)
"While Baker may immediately lobby Congress and supervise employees who directly lobby the FCC, to comply with President Barack Obama's ethics pledge, she may not personally lobby any executive branch political appointee (including the FCC) while Obama is in office. However after two years, she may lobby non-political appointees at the FCC. Additionally she may never personally lobby anyone on the Comcast/NBC merger agreement"
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
In theory, true.
Just like a good manager can manage anything.
In practice, however, a lobbyist is much more valuable if he or she has cultivated contacts and inside access to a particular regulatory bureaucracy. They guy pestering the Assistant Deputy Undersecretary in the lobby is vastly less effective, and commands much less money, than the guy who can dial the private phone number of the department head's own secretary and schedule a couple hours with his immediate successor in the job of department head.
And that's where the conflict of interest lives: a person gained access and personal trust in the context of public service. He cashes in on that asset, originally conferred for the benefit of the public, for his own personal benefit (bigtime lobbying contracts) and the benefit of his private clients (in the regulated field). Plus, you know, regulatory capture.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
What I can't put my finger on is exactly when this behavior and conflict of interest in general because fine. It's rife throughout government. We see it in a big way in the SCOTUS, and the state governments are even worse than the federal government. But *NO ONE* seems to care. This wasn't the same in the 70s and 80s, or perhaps it was and the difference is that these idiots aren't even embarrassed by it any more.
What changed? The size of the federal government.
Federal, State, Local Spending in 20th Century
At the start of the 20th century, government spending was principally local government spending. Out of a total of 7 percent of GDP, a full 4 percent was spent at the local level. Federal spending spiked in World War I, but in the 1920s, local government still represented about half of all government spending. In the 1930s this changed, and federal spending surged to about half of all government spending. After the spike of World War II the federal share increased again and state government spending also began to increase as a percent of GDP, so that by the 2010s federal spending checked in at over 20 percent of GDP, state spending amounted to 8 to 9 percent of GDP and local spending exceeded 10 percent of GDP.
Spending equals power. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
So why the hell do people think we can solve our problems by giving this government MORE power?
Giving this out-of-control power-mad government more money and more power will make things BETTER? For WHO?
I see that there's the potential for abuse there, and I'm sure it is abused this way sometimes, but I don't see the job offers as proof that it's happening. It DOES make good sense for these companies to hire people with inside, high profile jobs from the governing organizations, whether or not the policies they enacted hurt the company (in some ways probably more so). These are very strong job candidates even without bribery being a consideration. Even if we were omnisciently certain that no quid-pro-quo existed, these are people who would get (and arguably deserve) great job offers.
The questions then become how do we identify actual abuse (vs normal labor market forces) and how do we stop it?
In non-government positions, if this were a concern (not to the public, but to the original employer), there would be a non-compete clause of some sort. I'm not aware of government jobs ever having non-compete clauses, but it would probably be prohibitively difficult to do (not that it shouldn't be done, but it's so difficult to fire most US government employees that I can't imagine it being easy to implement even more labor restrictions). We could perhaps lobby for that, but it's doubtful to happen. I'm open to suggestions, but without other options this just seems like unconstructive complaining.
Government agencies regard the people as a rancher regards his cattle.
wow. being purposefully ignorant is twice as blissful.
Yeah, ignorant - and only HALF of the story in this headline.
Tom Wheeler, the new incoming FCC Chairman is a leading industry lobbyist. GIGO.
"Wheeler has been around telecommunications policy circles for years and has served as a lobbyist for the cable industry's trade group, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, and the wireless industry's trade association, CTIA-The Wireless Association. He spent 12 years as the head of the CTIA."
http://www.cnet.com/news/senate-confirms-tom-wheeler-as-fccs-new-chairman/
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Have you bothered to look up Meredith Attwell Baker's history? She Is a Lawyer & Lobbyist by profession with connections to various politically families (Bushes, Bakers, etc). Her education is in Spanish & journalism, what about this would make her a good fit for the mobile phone industry. She is a career lobbyist, nothing more, nothing less. Why she was ever the FCC commissioner is beyond my comprehension.
The issue is if the regulator, instead of stopping abuse, let it slide for the promise of a future high paying job. In my book that is bribery, and I'm sure many people agrees with me.
That's part of it, but there's more. The topic is called regulatory capture. An inherent problem in all regulation is that those being regulated have a vested interest in "capturing" the regulators and influencing them for their own interests. It's often not as simple as bribery or a promise of a future job. It can be (and often is) things like convincing regulators that certain kinds of regulation are great ideas, regulations that 1) make the regulators think they are doing something, 2) can be easily implemented by that regulated entity, and (entirely coincidentally!) 3) hinder the competitors of the regulated entity. Whenever you read about bankers being in favor of Dodd-Frank, or health insurers being pro-Obamacare, or a large company that supports raising the minimum wage, look for something like #3. Such support does not usually come from the goodness of their hearts.
As pointed out in this thread, who knows the complexity of a set of regulations better than someone who used to be in charge of them? So too much separation between regulators and regulated would be dysfunctional: you don't want carpenters regulating doctors, or vice versa. But the whole field shows some of the inherent problems of all regulations, especially complex ones.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
So... can we have less government power over everything in everyone's life then? Since it ends up being used against us by Washington insiders...?
You're naive.
Often, such abuse only surfaces after the damage is done, and after fabulous sums in attorney's fees are paid, with a likely outcome of plea deal-- if it gets that far.
The ethics problem here is huge. These were insiders, and party to all of the internal sausage that makes decisions work, and know intimately, the vulnerabilities. Fueled with the grease of lobbying money, they arrive again with seemingly wonderful arguments, except that instead of representing the people of the United States, they now represent shareholders looking for revenue, two completely and potentially opposite ideals.
This very constructive complaining, as net neutrality is the egalitarian backbone principal of Internet access. It's being destroyed with a "more equal than other equals" sort of Orwellian lie perpetrated by the telecoms strictly for favor of their shareholders. Open your eyes to what's happening in front of you: a new privileged Internet, where privilege comes directly out of your wallet.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Lots of easy constructive ideas:
1) vote
2) boycott
3) inform those in Wash DC of their folly
4) vote with $$ just like the big guys do
5) present the facts, and let people decide.
Etc. Doesn't take imagination. We've been here before.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.