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The Android Administration: Google's Relationship With the Obama White House (theintercept.com)
theodp writes: The Intercept takes a look at Google's remarkably close relationship with the Obama White House, driving home its point with charts of When Google Visited the White House and how individuals have moved Back and Forth Between Google and Government. "Much of this collaboration could be considered public-minded," writes David Dayen. "It's hard to argue with the idea that the government should seek outside technical help when it requires it. And there's no evidence of a quid pro quo. But this arrangement doesn't have to result in outright corruption to be troubling. The obvious question that arises is: Can government do its job with respect to regulating Google in the public interest if it owes the company such a debt of gratitude?"
One interesting meeting The Intercept missed was a 2014 sit-down of Google and Microsoft execs with the head of the National Science Foundation and educators following a White House Hour of Code event, at which President Obama was 'taught to code' by Google-backed Code.org with Google-exec-turned-US-CTO Megan Smith looking on. Asked about the event in an interview, the President suggested the school system was to blame for his daughters not taking to coding the way he'd like. "I think they got started a little bit late," the President explained. "Part of what you want to do is introduce this with the ABCs and the colors." Less than a year later, the President sought to redress things with his Computer Science for All K-12 Initiative, citing Google-provided factoids ("Nine out of ten parents want it taught at their children's schools") to explain the need for the $4B budget request for the program.
One interesting meeting The Intercept missed was a 2014 sit-down of Google and Microsoft execs with the head of the National Science Foundation and educators following a White House Hour of Code event, at which President Obama was 'taught to code' by Google-backed Code.org with Google-exec-turned-US-CTO Megan Smith looking on. Asked about the event in an interview, the President suggested the school system was to blame for his daughters not taking to coding the way he'd like. "I think they got started a little bit late," the President explained. "Part of what you want to do is introduce this with the ABCs and the colors." Less than a year later, the President sought to redress things with his Computer Science for All K-12 Initiative, citing Google-provided factoids ("Nine out of ten parents want it taught at their children's schools") to explain the need for the $4B budget request for the program.
I'm sure Google is happy to help give the feds access to private data and decrypt locked Android devices. It's not a whole lot different that the tight relationship between the federal government and HP under Carly Fiorina.
Government will never be completely free of corporate influence or corruption, so our expectations have to be realistic.
Keep the graft to the minimum necessary so that personal freedoms are not compromised. Accept that a government of the people will be flawed, like the people.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
>But this arrangement doesn't have to result in outright corruption to be troubling
We don't have proof that there's any corruption going on between Google and the US government, but, trust us, there's corruption alright.
Really, 9 out of 10? The survey was about computer science, not coding, right? Where coding is a subset of C.S.
Kids should be introduced to computers in elementary school, even if it's like one hour a week from third grade on.
Maybe one quarter or semester in middle school. But a general tech/computer class, with maybe a week of introduction to programming.
But as for more than that? Or a strong focus on coding? No. Not all kids will be interested. But giving them like a weeklong taste in middle school I'd think be good enough.
But as for a computer class, learning about various operating systems, hardware, history of the Internet (I figure to use small "i" for Internet), networking, Internet safety, etc.
It is a vocation, like mechanics, or plumbing, or typing.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
But this arrangement doesn't have to result in outright corruption to be troubling.
Yes, it does. Haters gotta hate, eh? But no, the rest of us do not.
to be pushing Google's agenda, hyperbole, and propaganda through our government (and this was painfully obvious in the last state of the union address), form an independent body for crying out loud. I am hoping this is no longer the case once we have a new president, it most certainly is NOT good for us, nor for innovation at large.
During the terms of Obama's administration, Google has been investigated multiple times by the FTC and hit with multimillion dollars fines and settlements at least 4 or 5 times (maybe more), I believe. In fact just this year in light of the EU complaint some members of the Senate Judiciary Committee are pressing the FTC to reopen an antitrust investigation they previously had closed in 2013 for lack of clear evidence of antitrust behavior. That may change with the information that the EU brings against Google. The point is, Google may be helping the government with an eye to receiving favorable rulings by the FTC, but its hard to say if they've actually benefited all that much, particularly since there are interest groups and corporations that have very deep pockets and influence with the government that are applying their own pressure to make life difficult for Google.
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As It is corporate Americas patriotic duty.
And partisanship that results in the failure of America is treason.
Why is a relationship between Google and the White House anywhere near as bad as one between our lawmakers and Boeing, Lockheed, tobacco companies, cable companies, or firearms companies? I trust Google way more than those other guys, and for the White House to actively sway anything in favour of Goog would make waves.
theory and ideal (and propaganda) about usa government are very different from actual reality. historically as well as now.
its good to have ideals and aspire to them , but nobody should be shocked that ideals are not real and usa government is in effect more or less controlled by wealthy. in fact even in federalist papers, this is foreseen, and a solution (which is not an ideal) is proposed.
how to prevent government from being captured by wealthy? create opportunity to have lots of wealthy people, with conflicting interests, prevent the wealthy from solidifying into a permanent aristocracy and elite through generations, and allow for maximum income, social, and class, mobility, so that there is very high turnover in the people who constitute the wealthy.
this seems to have worked so far , but may not work in future.
economic mobility still happens, but in a very restricted sense.
truly poor no longer become billionaires, as once happened, only children of educated upper middle class seems to get to the top. you start your company in your parents ample garage . you no longer start in streets in poorer part of town.
and educated elite in upper middle class seems to be solidifying in to a broad aristocracy with its own ideology, reinforced with high cost of education. without networking and education at elite schools, one cannot get the best paying jobs and have access to capital.
so the real story is not capture of government by google in particular to benefit google, and harm other companies and masses.
real story is capture of government by an elite with its own ideology, and interests, and wants them satisfied vs rest of population . people who work at google, apple, various banks , and other successful companies, tend to think and act alike.
Google has been highly influential in at least one area -- patents. The head of the USPTO and various high level patent judges are from Google. Google doesn't like software patents, and by some coincidence, software patents are being rejected right and left. So I think that they are getting their money's worth.
I'm going to be something bad here: I'm going to mention Gamergate. Setting aside the vitriol and the conspiracy theories, Gamergate was about the complicated relationship between journalists and the people who they report on. There was a game developer who befriended some journalists and eventually started to date one and who, independent of that, got some favorable press for her game. The question raised was: just how independent of that relationship was the press that she received? The individual who she dated stayed away from writing anything about her himself, but even if we give maximum credit to the integrity of his coworkers, a friendship, even a casual friendship, will influence a person's perspective on the subject and people who they write about.
::sigh:: No, of course not.
Journalistic integrity on this matter is blurry. A journalist is expected to maintain relationships with sources, but to somehow keep those relationships from perverting their perspective.
So... this was my thought immediately upon reading the summary here. We want industry representatives to stay out of Washington, but we need our legislators to act from an informed position. There needs to be some kind of relationship there, but exactly what that should look like is blurry. We've recently had a very public and very nasty "debate" over something very similar (though much less influential) and that's what immediately sprung to mind when I read this. Is there any chance that the debate here will be more civil?
Seems like a rancidly dumb suggestion to me. Hurry up, January.
See subject: "Mighty Google" (lol, not) Mr. Obama's tech advisor is my inferior as I always knew... thanks for proving it publicly for me!
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APK
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Funny, I suppose that trying to discredit and opposing opinion as astro-turf when it is too inconvenient to call me a nazi is par for the course.
Tell how it feels to have your nose squarely up Davis Dayen's ass?
People love to throw around the term "fascism", particularly towards those who want strong national borders (which is actually "nationalism").
Fascism is NOT strong borders. Many non-fascist nations have had strong borders.
Fascism is NOT goose-stepping soldiers. Goose-stepping is common in the militaries of socialist, communist, and dictatorships.
Fascism is NOT international adventurism. History is full of non-fascist nations going to war.
Fascism is NOT racism. Racists exist in all cultures and races, without regard to political or economic systems.
Fascism is NOT government spying on people. Governments spy on people in direct proportion to how totalitarian they are. As western supposedly democratic societies grow their governments and inject those governments into ever-increasing aspects of the lives of their people, they increase their spying on those people.
Fascists, like Hitler's NAZIs, can certainly have all the above characteristics, but these are NOT part of the definition of Fascism. It's a bit like defining a "clown" as a person wearing a wig and makeup; most clowns wear wigs and makeup, but so do lots of non-clowns.
Fascism is a mutant form of socialism (created by Italian socialist Mussolini) where the socialism is indirect. Government unites with business and allows the illusion of market economics while actually manipulating the economics and the population through businesses. Businesses get into "partnership" with government. The businesses that "play ball" are favored and there is a revolving door between government officials and corporate office holders. Businesses that do not cooperate, or are contrary to the politics of the leaders, find that it is very difficult to get necessary approvals and certifications (sort of like those TEA Party groups that, seven years later are still waiting for IRS approval). Fascists blur the lines between government and business so that the public on the surface level may see a separation, but a closer examination leaves doubt about just who is in charge of any particular business or government activity, the politician or the business person. Fascists are perfectly happy to have big bold public connections between government and communications experts. The NAZIs were happy to have everyone know about Goebbels and Riefanstahl etc. Anti-fascists are repelled by, and suspicious of, such things which is why American administrations of both parties have historically pretended to be disconnected from the communicators of the society (JFK for example was a personal friend of Walter Cronkite, but neither of these men or their people highlighted it for the public)
Fascism is NOT "crony capitalism". Crony capitalism is a pay-to-play scheme. Crony capitalists have sadly long been evident in the US. They give money to politicians and the politicians favor their businesses with contracts, regulations favorable to them, regulations unfavorable to their competitors, etc. With crony capitalism, the corruption is hidden from view and the last thing the participants want is any public blurring of lines. Crony capitalists do not want the public to see any direct connections between the politicians and the businesses.
economic mobility still happens, but in a very restricted sense. truly poor no longer become billionaires, as once happened, only children of educated upper middle class seems to get to the top. you start your company in your parents ample garage . you no longer start in streets in poorer part of town.
Interestingly, in attempting to discount this statement, I got a mixed review.
Warren Buffett, son of a Congressman
Sam Walton, son of a poor farmer
Carlos Slim, son of poor Middle eastern immigrants whose father died when he was 13
Larry Ellison, son of an unwed NY Jewish mother who was given to his aunt/uncle when his pneumonia proved too much for mom
Mark Zuckerberg, son of a dentist and psychiatrist
Bill Gates, prominent lawyer father and board member mother
Amancio Ortega Gaona, son of a railway worker went to work as a teenager
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
come on guys, they do not have a close relationship, they are at least a mile away from the white house. on the otherhand, there is microsoft who is a mere quarter mile away.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Boeing, Lockheed, tobacco companies, gun companies, and most other companies of all sorts:
1. Are not controlling your access to information, possibly manipulating what you can find and your perception about what's right/wrong, popular/unpopular, good/bad etc. Google and Facebook are information gateways to most of the public.
2. Are not tied primarily to one political party, simultaneously serving that party's president in his governing role as he runs agencies that are supposed to be nonpartisan and serve the entire population, while also assisting his party in partisan activities from polling and messaging to get-out-the-vote activities.
3. Are not continually cycling large numbers of people back-and-forth between the administration in the White House and the corporate board room. (Boeing got caught trying this a few years ago with one person related to one contract for aerial tankers and heavy legal sanctions were (rightly) applied).
Presidents of both parties have a long tradition of calling on certain industry leaders or experts to join committees or panels to study a national issue and produce a public report. Norm Augustine is an example who has been called upon by both Democrats and Republicans to study NASA issues. This is very different from what the Obama administration has been doing ion nearly blurring the lines between Google and parts of the federal government. Up in the Bay Area, Google is actually running NASA facilities now, and in the White House when people interact with Google people do those non-Google employees REALLY know who they are interacting with?
i am referring to usa .
all the americans you refer were well off with regard to family that they grew up in .
as i said "only children of educated upper middle class seems to get to the top. you start your company in your parents ample garage ". parents as in family one grows up in and pays for ones education.
to add to my reply since you include Sam Walton , my point was , as i already spelled out, precisely that there are no longer billionaires who grew up poor like Sam Walton, who is from an earlier generation than other americans