FTC Attorney Joins Microsoft 123
inode_buddha writes "Randall Long, a senior attorney who led several antitrust investigations against Google, has been hired by Microsoft. From the article: 'The software giant told the Wall Street Journal yesterday that it hired Randall Long, an official at the FTC's Bureau of Competition. When he joins the software giant at the end of the month, Long will head up Microsoft's regulatory affairs division in Washington.
Long was involved in FTC reviews of Google's acquisitions of both DoubleClick and AdMob. According to the Journal's unnamed sources, Long was especially outspoken about Google's AdMob acquisition, saying that the FTC should challenge the deal. His reservations were eventually set aside and the deal was approved in 2010.'"
Graft (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Graft (Score:5, Informative)
The U.S. has some rules as well. Since fairly recently [wikipedia.org], federal politicians and high-level employees are restricted from working as lobbyists in their former areas for 1-2 years after leaving federal employment. However it doesn't look like the job Randall Long was high enough up to be covered (it's also not entirely clear if his new job constitutes lobbying, or if he's heading some sort of litigation group instead).
Re:Graft (Score:5, Informative)
Well the US is not one of those places. People are pretty much free to quit one job and take another.
Not necessarily. As a random example, if you're an FAA safety inspector you have to wait two years before you can be hired by an airline for a job that involves interacting with the FAA.
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=mro&id=news/avd/2011/08/30/04.xml [aviationweek.com]
Re:Revolving Door (Score:5, Informative)
Sure something can be done or at the very least some steps can be taken. Here in Hong Kong retired govt officials have to apply to the Civil Services Bureau before they can take up a new position. The policy is outlined here [csb.gov.hk].
The essence of it lies in the following
(a) civil servants on final leave and former civil servants will not take up work which may:
(i) constitute real or potential conflict of interest with their former government duties, or
(ii) casue well-founded negative public perception embarrassing the Government and undermining the image of the Civil Service, or give rise to reasonable apprehension of deferred reward or benefit by a fair-minded and informed observer after having considered the relevant facts;
(b) the said individuals' right to work after ceasing government service will not be duly restricted; and
(c) the attractiveness of the Civil Service as a career will not be adversely affected and limited human resources will be put to good use.
This has worked sometime and has not worked sometime. It has also been used to harrass individuals who have embarrassed the government while on the job ( one prominent civil servant reportedly did not get clearance for 2 years to work as a journalist because he obviously had some dirt on some senior officials.
Having said that, atleast there is a policy and matters can be taken to court if required.
May not apply to many places like the US.
Re:It certainly appears to be corruption (Score:3, Informative)
There are much worse cases, also in countries regarded to be of low corruption level.
What about this asshole [wikipedia.org] which got high position in gazprom afrer making high-level international deal for their favor. And now you are not even allowed to say that he colours his hair.