Investors Ask How Much Google Spends On Lobbying 81
Taco Cowboy writes: It has been estimated that Google has spent over $60 million on lobbying in Washington D.C. this year alone, and that figure does not include the money that Google gives to various trade organizations and "third party" groups. According to CNN: "On its website, Google lists 43 trade associations that it belongs to, such as the Ad Council and National Cyber Security Alliance, although it says that is a 'representative listing' and Google doesn't indicate how much money it gives these organizations. Google also has links to over 100 third-party groups like the AARP, Heritage Foundation and iKeepSafe that it 'provides support to.'" A group of Google investors are demanding that Google owns up to what they spend on and how much, and their push stems from one thing, and that thing is mainly connected to political correctness. It's public knowledge that Google contributes to the US Chamber of Commerce, and to some quarters, "the Chamber" is suffering from "Climate Change Denial Symptom" and they are doing their best to cut off any funding to "the Chamber" from Google.
A group of Google investors (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:A group of Google investors (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, everyone knows Google is a bastion of right-wing lobbying and giving. Why, you can just look at all their strictly traditional holiday search page images and their complete lack of focus on left-wing causes in their news releases, promotional materials and spending.
Good thing we have groups like these "investors" who are concerned not that they're making money, but that Google isn't contributing anything to any group which may in some way not agree with progressives to keep Google "correct" politically.
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I'm surprised that Google would stoop to involvement in what appears to be a giant system of bribery for favorable government action and attention.
Neither Democrabs or Repukelicants are willing to seriously abolish what appears to be a illegal system of money worship that circumvents ordinary citizens ability to ask similar favors of our government. And that fucking does NOT rock, bros.
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They never had this slogan to begin with. It was "don't be evil" not "do no evil".
And even in the early days, the scope of this slogan was quite limited. It was a business strategy along the lines of "treat our users correctly so that they want to stay with us rather than head to our competitors as soon as they can". It never was the irrealistic ideal people make it to be.
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When you need your investors to show you how to "do no evil" , wouldn't that mean it doesn't apply any longer?
Google doesn't get to exist in a system where votes aren't for sale. Perhaps they should just allow the truly psychopathic to buy all the influence? That would be "less Evil", right? Hrmmm?
Eric Schmidt's debate with Peter Thiel actually goes into some of this strategy a bit, if you want to find out fer reals. I think he probably even said too much, but it's out there.
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The Koch brothers have spent hundreds of millions of dollars lobbying and received tens of billions of dollars in tax breaks and corporate welfare as a result
If you consider that the Kochs received close to a hundred to one return on investment, then Google would be stupid NOT to spend the money in a similar effort
B'sides, they just might convince some of the Luddites that science actually works
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Hey, don't get in the way of Taco Cowboy's Libertarian leanings, 'cause he is a true believer that government can't do anything right
I am just waiting to see evidence of a private company discovering a way to profit by NOT turning the world into an unlivable cesspool
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Sure, and those companies operate under supervision of laws that make those things possible
Look at water rights for example. British common law developed due to competitive use of water by different groups, agricultural, industrial and domestic. As a result the laws regulated how each land owner could affect the water running through their property. This is a very effective form of government control and is the model for water law that is followed in the US
On the other hand Spanish water law had a top-down
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Government control keeps companies from abusing each other, the public and the environment
Blasphemy. Adam Smith's Invisible Hand is turning in its grave.
Investors have little rights (Score:4, Interesting)
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But Google is spewing money at these CONservatives that hate us and want us to die. Killing us is pretty serious business. The Chamber desires to create massive destruction through climate change.
You misread the summary. The chamber is favor of stopping climate change. Other people (I don't know who) want to defund it because of that.
Frankly I didn't realize how many groups Google donates to. I knew they did a lot, but they are prolific.
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Recognizing the actual costs and not just sweeping them under the rug for the rest of us to take care of is not 'progressive', it used to be called doing business
Too many business 'leaders' think that shirking your costs off onto a sucker is the way to behave, I call is carny hucksterism and it is doomed to fail in the long haul
Bribery (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, Google could add a lot of value here.
They could create a vote buying system, much like their reverse auction ad bid system.
Have each senator put up the issues they are happy swing vote on and then have all the interest groups bid away.
It's probably the next logical step in what is effectively now a bribe based system of legislation.
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Oh, you mean like this system [ipaidabribe.com] for India (which didn't need Google to create it).
Re:Bribery (Score:4, Funny)
Not at all. That's some populist nonsense that's supposed to end bribery. It's no wonder Google had no hand in it.
What Google needs to make is a system that streamlines bribery, synergizing capitalism and Web 3.0.
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Actually, Google could add a lot of value here. They could create a vote buying system, much like their reverse auction ad bid system.
Ahhh..yes - a Google Bank you mean, right?
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Investors ask how much /. Media paid for Malware (Score:5, Insightful)
Because whatever they paid is about to cost them a whole lot more money and good will. [slashdot.org]
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It's all about the climate change nutballs trying to stop ANYONE that disagrees with them. Heck they already want climate change deniers put to death.
I'm guessing you don't have any citations for that?
"Political correctness"?!? Good God! (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously, has this term devolved to the point where it means promoting ANY idea that could be loosely considered left-leaning by the right wing fringe?
We're talking climate change. It's not an agenda--it's just science, it's neutral. If your policies stem from actively avoiding scientific data, your policies aren't going to be very good. Claiming that science has a leftist bias basically implies that there's no conservative way to deal with reality, and that's simply untrue.
And even IF we were talking about a liberal agenda, like, I dunno, single-payer healthcare or something... politically correct? Really? That's not the right term at all. Politically correct is about talking politely, using respectful terms for people, so that political discourse can happen without the discussion devolving into name-calling. Since the beginning, it's been a bit of a conservative boogeyman, some sort of proto-government-censorship (different only in that the government doesn't, you know, actually censor anything). To some degree, the demonization of the concept worked. People now no longer seem to spend much time before spouting an epithet or three, and political conversation goes nowhere fast.
So you're saying supporting policies that are informed by sound science is... er, politeness. No, really, maybe you should keep the political correctness boogeyman and the climate change boogeyman in separate corners, never to mingle again.
Magellan (Score:2)
Actively avoiding scientific data like that from the Magellan project?
?
Two of the top ten hits suggests that this refers to a spacecraft that orbited Venus, so I assume that this is some reference to the Venus greenhouse effect?
https://www.google.com/search?... [google.com]
Oh please U.S. Chamber of Commerce ? (Score:2)
What is this another case of beat up random people that you can because you can't get the ones you want ?
http://www.ucsusa.org/sites/de... [ucsusa.org]
There you go, as of 2011 China is at 27% of the emissions and still growing in both percentage and absolute amount.
Maybe these people need to disinvest in China and stop buying Chinese products ? Or maybe they just have some sort of a grudge they are pursuing by other means.
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What is this another case of beat up random people that you can because you can't get the ones you want ?
http://www.ucsusa.org/sites/de... [ucsusa.org]
There you go, as of 2011 China is at 27% of the emissions and still growing in both percentage and absolute amount.
Maybe these people need to disinvest in China and stop buying Chinese products ? Or maybe they just have some sort of a grudge they are pursuing by other means.
Can't do that. China is, at this point, decades ahead of the US in renewable energy tech. There's no way we can address climate change in any reasonable timeframe without using Chinese products, at least in the near term. I don't know if China's huge investment in renewable tech is related to the fact that they don't have a Chamber of Commerce over there, I'll leave that for you to consider.
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http://imgur.com/dXHWhNr [imgur.com]
Do you see the red in that picture ? That's the CO2 mankind has added to the atmosphere. Color me unworried.
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http://imgur.com/dXHWhNr [imgur.com]
Do you see the red in that picture ? That's the CO2 mankind has added to the atmosphere. Color me unworried.
What an excellent standard for whether something is a problem! So, if, for example, the ocean levels rose 30 meters, inundating nearly every coastal city and displacing a majority of the human population, I could whip up a chart showing that the volume of water we added to the oceans is really actually just a tiny, barely noticeable red sliver compared to the rest of the water on the planet, and therefore my fellow refugees and I have nothing at all to worry about--almost as if it's not happening at all!
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18 years 5 months no warming
https://wattsupwiththat.files.... [wordpress.com]
CO2 above the worst case scenario from the IPCC
Warming Below the best case scenario. from the IPCC
I applaud your ability to get hysterical and while still believing people who are repeatedly wrong.
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LOL 45 years since earthday 1 call me when your side gets 1 right.
Of course I am more than one up on you. I am not cheering for disasters.
Re:Oh please U.S. Chamber of Commerce ? (Score:4, Informative)
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Yeah why worry about tipping a balanced system. I mean, I look outside and I can't even see any CO2 at all! And did you know that it snowed at my house this past winter?! The scientists probably just made up CO2 so they can buy yachts and gold teeth.
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"decades ahead of the US in renewable energy tech" Can you source this grandiose claim? The only Chinese renewable energy advances were flooding the market with cheap solar panels which were copies of the solar panels designed and manufactured in the US. I am not sure this puts China a decade ahead of the US.
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If they go to MIT or any other University or College a sizable percentage stay in the US to work. And if China has developed some super cool gizmo that puts them 10 years ahead of the US in developing new technologies they are sure keeping quite about it. Maybe they are sitting on a warp drive, anti-gravity generator, an inertial dampener system, or maybe a cure for cancer?
By the way I go to China on business about 3 times a year and the people I meet there are very friendly and courteous unlike the pricks
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So you are saying the US only produces intellectual property that translates to new products of all sorts and China just builds the products? And what are "typical" Americans? There is not one single country on the planet as diverse in race, culture, or religion as the US population. The US ranks in the top 3 manufactures in the world depending on how the figures are calculated. China is increasingly having to compete against other nations in South East Asia. China's economy has been built on low labor cos
Wicked hard problem (Score:2)
What is this another case of beat up random people that you can because you can't get the ones you want ? http://www.ucsusa.org/sites/de... [ucsusa.org] There you go, as of 2011 China is at 27% of the emissions and still growing in both percentage and absolute amount. Maybe these people need to disinvest in China and stop buying Chinese products ? Or maybe they just have some sort of a grudge they are pursuing by other means.
(I will point out that this large number is only because China has such a large population. In terms of emission per person, USA beats them hands down)
Can't do that. China is, at this point, decades ahead of the US in renewable energy tech. There's no way we can address climate change in any reasonable timeframe without using Chinese products, at least in the near term. I don't know if China's huge investment in renewable tech is related to the fact that they don't have a Chamber of Commerce over there, I'll leave that for you to consider.
That is why climate change is a wicked hard problem [ssireview.org]: you can't solve it on your own-- it has to be a collaborative solution involving multiple countries.
And that, in turn, is why some people would rather deny that the problem exists rather than find a way to solve it: they have an ideology that says the US should never work in collaboration with other nations
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That makes China drastically more efficient than the USA, since they have over 4 times as many people. Once the USA cuts it's emissions to 1/3 of the current level then maybe China will be the issue.
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If you are seriously worried about CO2 China is the issue now. It's CO2 output is larger than the U.S. and will soon be larger than the combined output of the U.S. and the E.U. So the question is are you about the climate or are you just a tool of a cause you don't understand ?
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It pretty much doesn't damn well matter. (Score:3)
It pretty much doesn't damn well matter. The investors can want whatever they want, and it won't matter.
Between Sergey, Larry, and Eric, they control more than 50% of the voting stock, and therefore they control the board, and the investors can go pound sand for all of the real fiscal influence they have on the company. The can more or less just shut up and take their profits on the rise of the non-voting stock price, or they can sell their stock and let someone else take the profits.
PS: I notice no one has mentioned the fact that a lot of the charitable organizations they are giving to are 501(c)(3)'s, and they represent matching contributions for contributions by employees:
"Google will match employee donations from a minimum gift of $50 up to $6,000 per donor per year."
https://doublethedonation.com/... [doublethedonation.com]
Conrad Black was convicted of fraud. (Score:3)
Conrad Black was convicted of fraud. The situation with Google is entirely different.
They have a contract with their employees for matching charitable contributions. This is a significant employee benefit.
It's asinine to insist that all of Google's employees be Social Democrats, Green Party, or any other single political block. They are a diverse group, and they will support a diverse set of causes, as diverse groups of people do.
Sergey, Larry, and Eric have been reasonable custodians of their company in
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Every company has a PAC. Once you get to a certain level you had better be giving money to that PAC, or you are not a "team player". Good luck moving up in the hierarchy, or even keeping your job, if you don't.
I was in a smallish aerospace company (by now they've pass $1 billion in sales, which is not big in that industry), and I saw this first hand.
Grow up. There's no room for honest dissent in corporate cul
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Have you ever worked for a politically connected US corporation? From your comments I assume not.
Every company has a PAC. Once you get to a certain level you had better be giving money to that PAC, or you are not a "team player". Good luck moving up in the hierarchy, or even keeping your job, if you don't.
I was in a smallish aerospace company (by now they've pass $1 billion in sales, which is not big in that industry), and I saw this first hand.
Grow up. There's no room for honest dissent in corporate culture. It's a subset of the reality that there's no room for honestly in corporate culture.
This does not mesh with my experience working at:
- Novell
- Artisoft
- IBM (after they bought our startup)
- Apple
- Google
Perhaps the aerospace industry is more corrupt?
Both Google and Apple had *very active* PACs, and there was no consequence to not voting Democrat when Steve Jobs urged you to do so, or not contributing to Google's NETPAC when the executives urged you to do so.
Google's pretty much all over the map on who they contribute to, and the article is full of crap, pretty much it all gets disclosed:
ht [google.com]
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Perhaps the aerospace industry is more corrupt?
To be fair, it's probably not as corrupt as the oil industry.
Why single out Google? (Score:2)
How much do other companies give, when you add it all up?
I know Microsoft gives to so-called "think tanks" to scientifically prove their propaganda is true.
Does Microsoft use it's money, and influence, to have smear campaigns published?
When I see Google singled out like this, I suspect a smear campaign, rather than a neutral party trying to inform the public.
Santa here (Score:1)
When I see Google singled out like this, I suspect a smear campaign, rather than a neutral party trying to inform the public.
This is Santa Claus, I'm making a list and checking it twice. Right now we're checking Google. Because 'G' comes before 'I' and 'M'. Apple is getting a lump of coal for Q4'15.
Google is a lobbying group (Score:2)
That sells marketing information and sort sometimes produces software. So totally Web 2.0.
Hypocrisy (Score:2)
So big companies corrupt politicians and organisations like FIFA, and nobody complains. Corruption flourishes because some entities propose money to people unable to say no. Both sides should be investigated by justice, but curiously little is done against big companies.