Lobbying Should Be Illegal....!!!!!

Max, if you are not already in politics, you should go into politics. You have failed to address my points. How is backroom testimony going to be better than public testimony under oath. I asume our decision makeres are wanting good information on which to make good decisions for their constituents. Your response was a classic denial and strawman argument sparsed in with some fluf...all too George II Republican.

If selling legislation for money is ok with you and everyone else, then we need to stop calling ourselves a democracy.

 

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You've got me, and all of my friends...:soapbox: Make America Socialist!!!

 

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I'm sick of SciForums and people who really can't read. I say

And you read this as saying I believe it's Ok "selling legislation for money."

Sorry for trying to give a more complicated and realistic perspective on your fantasy about banning all lobbying.

 

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There is nothing complicated about lobbying! Paying for "access" to our public officials is plain and simply corruption. And it should be illegal and prosecuted to the fullest extent necessary to keep our government of and for the people. Just because things have always been does not mean they cannot change. There is no legitmate reason for lobbying as you have referenced in previous posts.

 

That won't help at all they too take bribes in any socialist country today. Or

do you have proof otherwise? I'll listen to them if you pay me off!

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This is an odd non-sequiter.
1) We could easily restrict or outlaw lobbying and still have capitalism, huge corporations, stock markets, vast income differences...etc.
2) Socialism had it's own version of lobbying in most countries - the military often had tremendous lobbying power.

The books are free to be borrowed in the libraries - communism!

 

Generally, I'd be against banning lobbying. I think it would be a tough law to write, as you could not ban "individual" lobbying (i.e. by taxpayers), nor do I think you could ban a business organization's paying an individual taxpayer to lobby on its behalf. From the Congresscritter's perspective, that the corporate lobbyist is now a private citizen (rather than a lobbying firm or an officer of the business) makes no difference.

A "corporation" does not act on its own, it acts through human beings, and those human being might well actually believe in the corporation's proposed changes to the laws. How can you pass a law prohibiting him from telling an elected official that?

Here's why I don't think that would work...almost *every* politician would be on the dole. Your choices would not usually be between the honest guy who's uncorrupted and the guy who's in the back pockets of monied interests, it would be between two (or more) guys both of whom are in someone's back pocket. Your choice would be "whose corruption offends me least." Often it would likely come down to picking the guy who's corporate owners you object to less. ("Well, the first candidate is beholden to the PETA, the Ethanol lobby, and the RIAA, but the second candidate is a lackey for big oil, the auto manufacturers and NAMBLA, and that's why I am voting for the first guy.")

I wouldn't even blame them. The lure of money is a powerful thing, and every Congressman would be able to raise many millions very easily by serving business interests, and have to work his ass off schmoozing "the povs", err...I mean his valued constituents to raise the same amounts. So long as he can fall back on "everyone is doing it" the increased chances that he'll be voted out for that aren't that great, except in years when the electorate turns against incumbents generally.

"Everyone is doing it" is the reason even people who want campaign finance reform have often found themselves accepting money from sources they otherwise wanted banned. Rejecting funds from legal sources you *wish* were illegal often makes no strategic sense. (It's akin to unilateral disarmament. You can do it, but you can't then be surprised when your still armed opponent takes advantage of your self-imposed weakness.)

I think you might as well give big business the franchise as repeal campaign finance laws, with the number of votes cast being proportional to their net income.