Google's New Lobbying Power in Washington

*SECADM writes "Learning from Microsoft's error, Google is building a lobbying power house in Washington." From the Washington Post article: Two years ago, Google was on the verge of making that Microsoft-like error. Davidson, then a 37-year-old former deputy director of the Center for Democracy & Technology, was the search-engine company's sole staff lobbyist in Washington. As recently as last year, Google co-founder Sergey Brin had trouble getting meetings with members of Congress. To change that, Google went on a hiring spree and now has 12 lobbyists and lobbying-related professionals on staff here — more than double the size of the standard corporate lobbying office — and is continuing to add people.

I'll bite

[Anonymous Coward]

When I was in high school, my state had a YMCA Model Legislature program. Students would act as representatives, senators, and even governors (executive branch) to learn more about how the government worked. I was a lobbyist. The role of a lobbyist is to act as an expert on an issue. There may be lobbyists arguing both for and against a certain bill, giving valuable information to the committee of representatives and the chair so they can determine how to amend, pass, or not pass a certain bill. As you can see, a lobbyists are very important in the democratic process and often aren't even representing organizations. They may just be common citizens arguing their case on a certain bill. Disclaimer: This is my understanding of lobbyists in a bicameral legislature of a state government, but I assume it is similar at the national level. The captcha is "missed."

Re:what a lobbyist is and why they're important

[lawpoop]

As a fellow Ohioan, I am glad to hear that you are working on my side!

Perhaps, for the legislator's benefit, you could put together a document that demonstrates the difference between brute-force and phishing. Something like this might work well both on print-out and in power-point:

<H1>Brute-force Attack</H1>

Welcome to Online Banking! Please enter your username password:

Username: [e-mail]
Password: ******
Wrong password! Please try again.
Password: ******
Wrong password! Please try again.
Password: ******
Wrong password! Please try again.
Password: ******
Password accepted! Your balance is $125.00.


<H1>Phising Attack</H1>

From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Online Banking Password Maintenance


Message:
Hello! This is your bank. We've recently done some maintenance and upgrades to our online banking website. However, we've accidentally deleted your password. Please send us your password as soon as possible, in order for us to assure the outstanding customer service you've come to expect from us!

Here's a slashdot interview with a lobbyist...

[morganew]

and that Lobbyist was me [slashdot.org]! Many of these same questions keep popping up; things like "isn't lobbying bribery"? and "how dare congress listen to him/her!" Basic reality is, Members of Congress listen to their constituents, and issues they think will affect their constituents. And regardless of the opinion of Lessig and other ivory tower "experts", there is not simple answer to the money issue. I would posit that money has never been more important in politics, but 'single source' money has never been less influential.

Think of it this way, Members have to raise more than ever before, but they can still only raise it in relatively small amounts, so small that on single check for 2,000 has much influence when you consider that an average House race will cost in excess of 2 MILLION.

This creates a problem. The Representative must raise $2 Million, but has to do it in small amounts. This forces them to spend a disproportionate amount of time raising money, but it also lowers the influence of any one check. Members must spend endless hours calling hundreds of people to ask for $50, $100, maybe even $500 dollar contributions.

Because money is now a volume activity, all of the slashdotters who want to leap to the incorrect conclusion that all Lobbying is done through payouts from a few lobbyists are living in movieland. The reality is that the lobbyist's true power comes from being able to show a Representative how his support or opposition to a bill will make his Constituents happy - and encourage them vote for him. This reduces the Member's need to raise/spend money, and therefore is considered a great thing to the Member of Congress.

For example, Slashdotters assume that the only reason anyone would ever support the DMCA is because the RIAA paid them off. Well, as a recent consumerist report showed [slashdot.org], the RIAA hasn't written very many big checks! However, many of the Members of Congress who are the most agressive in support of the DMCA have songwriters, movie studios, themeparks and software companies in their districts. It should come as no surprise that they want to help the people they represent keep their jobs, pay taxes, and generally be happy with their elected officals. As a side note, if you wonder how that article in Consumerist and Slashdot affected Capitol Hill, well, it didn't - because no one called in. I did an informal poll of the members who were on the top of the RIAA list as presented here on slashdot. Guess what? most offices got only a couple of calls. Here on slashdot, the DMCA is treated like it's legislation that will bring about the next anti-christ, but the rest of America doesn't actually care. If you compare the 1 or 2 calls on the DMCA with what happens when the NRA, the WWF, Sierra Club, Right to Life or NOW pushes people to call in, you begin to understand that Members aren't being paid off, they just understand that their constituents aren't appreciably harmed by the DMCA - in fact many have jobs that benefit from it. There has yet to be a Gallup Poll showing the DMCA coming in ahead of HealthCare, the War in Iraq, Education, Social Security or even the proliferation of hangnails as experienced by the elderly. So stop assuming that the only reason anyone could support a position is a payoff.

SImply put, leaping to the conclusion that anyone who dissagrees with you must be 'bought off' creates a false dicotomy. If it were literally all about the money, then there would be a lot less work for lobbyists!

Tired of this mistake

[Anonymous Coward]

Google's well-known motto is "Don't Be Evil", not "Do No Evil".

It seems people use the latter more frequently than the former now, which is a pet peeve of mine. It's an easy mistake to make, but they're not at all the same thing. In some decisions you're forced to choose the lesser of multiple evils. For example, on the China censorship issue, you could easily have said Google is doing evil no matter regardless of what they did -- do they help enforce an evil government policy, or do they hurt users in China by making it more difficult for them to use their product?

Re:So?

[emc]

Or are his opinions about net neutrality and Chinese Internet censorship no more important than yours when congress discusses them?

No actually, they are no more important. The only difference is that he has more to gain or lose (financially) than I do.

Worthington's Law

[poopdeville]

This is called Worthington's Law. [youtube.com]

Re:Um...what was Microsoft's "error"?

[jorghis]

Remember the anti-trust thing? Microsoft assumed that as long as they werent some contracter trying to bribe the government for pork they didnt need to lobby. Politicians love to pick on big companies, but they go after the ones that arent spending money lobbying them. MS wasnt sending out bribes so they got attacked by politicians. Google is now recongizing that they have the potential to be hounded for privacy concerns, intellectual property violations, unfairly leveraging their dominant search engine, etc. So they arent going to fall into the same trap MS did and assume that just because they arent breaking any laws grandstanding politicians and their lawyers wont go after them.

Re:Puhleeze...

[morganew]

Your comment is proof that your mind is so clearly "made up" that no amount of knowledge or insight will change your tightly held (albeit unsupported) beliefs. But for the others who may be reading this thread, let's break it down:

1. You are completely right about some of the total corruption cases we have had - bad news, bad actors, and they got caught pretty easily. The scrutiny is pretty tight nowadays, and some will still be so arrogant as to believe they will get away with it, but history suggests that they are going to get caught.

2. "Members don't do things because they have people in their districts". My only answer to you on this is: you are an utter idiot if you actually believe that, get yourself a tinfoil hat and stay away from open windows. And since you make these assertions, tell me how you "know this? I can tell you in excruiating detail the days, nights, weeks, months and even years of work that goes into it. Building coalitions, identifying members who are interested, fending off other interests, educating educating educating. If money were the simple answer, legislation wouldn't take long to pass. THe proof point here is even bills that you view as corporate give-aways take YEARS to get done.

3. "Lobbyists write legislation" - . "Lobbyists" don't automatically write legislation - what they do is say to a Congressional office"If you are interested in this issue area, we'd like to meet with you to discuss legislation that might be of interest to your constituents, or is relevant to the Committee you Chair". Then, a meeting is held and you essentally "pitch" the prospective legislation. Describing why it's good, who benefits, what are the risks, etc. etc. If the Congressman is convinced, then the lobbyist may play a role in crafting the legislation. Your problem here is you see the transaction as a "black box". The reality is the lobbyist is an issue area expert in the subject of the legislation. He is driven by enlightened self interest to know more about a subject than anyone else; he must be able to develop the entire argument, and counter-argument for the legislation. Moreover, he has to understand the politics of the issue, and explain that as well. So to say "lobbyists write legislation" can also be said as "Issue Area Experts write legislation". Most congressional staff are people under 30 years old making around 30k a year. You WANT issue area experts to have a hand in crafting legislation. Also remember that if the bill is controversial, then the 'other side' will come in and argue against it. Literally every imaginable viewpoint gets heard, if not via lobbying, then via hearings.

4. "Public Policy is supposed to be for the public" While this phrase sounds pithy, it means nothing. You complain about the TPS, but note that the people talking were people who focus on public policy. If I go to OSCON, I want to hear Tridge talk about SAMBA, I don't want to hear someone who isn't part of the development team tell me about the next version of SAMBA. And your comment about Google being "right" at least on occasion proves the main problem you have. You use your own frame of reference to define why a decision was made. If it's a good decision, well, then it was in the public interest - if it was a bad decision it was driven by "Corporations". Yet you are the only person defining "good" and "bad". So your model is flawed from the outset - better to look at legislation from the perspective of enlightened self interest. For example, IBM is pumping lots of money into lobbying for ODF preferences and tech mandates to be made into law around the world. Normally, you would probably oppose tech mandates and preference. But if you support ODF being instituted via law, then would you ignore the clear corporate interests and claim it's good policy? If you do that, then you can't support a public vs. corporate viewpoint. Stop looking at it from the "good" vs. "bad" and start looking at it as enlightened self interest.

There are lot