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Top Amazon Boss Privately Advised US Government on Web Portal Worth Billions To Tech Firm (theguardian.com)
A top Amazon executive privately advised the Trump administration on the launch of a new internet portal that is expected to generate billions of dollars for the technology company and give it a dominant role in how the US government buys everything from paper clips to office chairs. From a report: Emails seen by the Guardian show that the Amazon executive Anne Rung communicated with a top official at the Government Services Authority (GSA) about the approach the government would take to create the new portal, even before the legislation that created it -- known to its critics as the "Amazon amendment" -- was signed into law late last year. Amazon and the Trump administration appear to have an antagonistic relationship because of the president's frequent Twitter attacks on the Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post. But the behind-the-scenes lobbying by Amazon officials underscores how the company has quietly amassed an unrivalled position of power with the federal government.
The 2017 correspondence between Rung -- a former official in the Obama administration credited with transforming the federal government's procurement policies before she joined Amazon -- and Mary Davie at the GSA, offers new insights into how Amazon has used key former government officials it now employs -- directly and as consultants -- to gain influence and potentially shape lucrative government contracts. It has not yet been determined which companies will build the US government's new e-commerce portal, but Amazon is widely expected to take on a dominant role, giving it a major foothold in the $53bn market for federal procurement of commercial products.
The 2017 correspondence between Rung -- a former official in the Obama administration credited with transforming the federal government's procurement policies before she joined Amazon -- and Mary Davie at the GSA, offers new insights into how Amazon has used key former government officials it now employs -- directly and as consultants -- to gain influence and potentially shape lucrative government contracts. It has not yet been determined which companies will build the US government's new e-commerce portal, but Amazon is widely expected to take on a dominant role, giving it a major foothold in the $53bn market for federal procurement of commercial products.
I find it interesting that the story repeatedly references "the Trump" administration in attack sentences, but later buried in the text we find out the Amazon exec doing the surreptitious advising...used to be in the Obama administration? (My suggestion is that she's likely simply leveraging personal contacts for personal/corporate enrichment.)
Do you really think Trump had a hand in making Bezos richer? Really? Because there's some cognitive dissonance here: Trump can't be a complete know-nothing boob nincompoop AND ALSO a criminal mastermind meticulously micro-managing the development of an Amazon-favoring web portal?
"But the behind-the-scenes lobbying by Amazon officials underscores how the company has quietly amassed an unrivalled position of power with the federal government. " TBH Amazon has generally amassed an unrivalled position of power WITH ALL OF AMERICAN COMMERCE.
-Styopa
Article summarized: Amazon does same lawfully-crooked things as other megacorps, reaps similarly lucrative rewards.
Lawful-Evil is the term you are looking for.
You know, back when this used to be a geek site...