Why Do Famous People Get Paid $250k to Give a Speech? | Hacker News Reader

Why Do Famous People Get Paid $250k to Give a Speech?

priceonomics.com

126 pointskungfudoi152 comments

While Hillary was Secretary of State, Bill's speaking fees from foreign interests dramatically skyrocketed.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/bill-clinton-cashed-hillary-s...

One example of these appears to be related to the uranium deal with Russia, where he bagged $500K. Hillary changed direction and signed off on the deal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-...

This is not the only form of payola for corrupt elites. Hillary's new book, for which she received a record $14M advance, sold less that 3000 copyies its first week. We've seen this before.

Results of the book's sells aren't that shocking if the sells per new book from her past books are accounted for: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/us/politics/clinton-boo...

Is shocking she got 14-million, which seems really fishy to me.

Great to see partisan political commentary on HN.

There is no proof of quid pro quo in that Russia uranium deal: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jun/...

Also, Clinton sold a lot more than 3000 copies that first week; more like 85000 (still not as good as her prior best sellers):

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/18/what-do-hil...

She's also going to be selling copies for the next 10 years.

Quoting Politifact isn't a rebuttal. Also, "quid pro quo" as used by politicians who peddle their influence is basically unprovable. It's a great standard for them to make mainstream, but unfortunately fails to accurately describe all the ways influence peddling and bribery schemes work.

You're confused. It's less than 3000.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/us/politics/clinton-book-s...

The larger number is for the disappointing sales of her previous book.

Nothing partisan about my comments. I'm not promoting any party. Just pointing out the sleaze.

Yes, I completely admit I had no idea she had a new book out this week. I'm assuming I'm not alone ><

No problem. There's more important stuff to keep up with.

So you are sayibg the original article that is basically saying "high speaking fees are normal, Clinton is normal, don't worry about it" is non-partisan; but providing a counter-argument that seems to show a conflict of interest is partisan?

It doesn't work that way.

The original article is non-partisan in its argument, the high speaking fees being normal applies equally to all parties, all famous people.

The OP I was responding to could be seen as making a non-partisan argument, however the focus was on Clinton rather than Trump and Clinton. So I interpreted is as partisan (and got a fact wrong about her new book). Tomahawk has responded since that it was not intended as partisan, and I'll take his/her word for it.

The $14M advance is still a rumor AFAIK. It's not much of a record either as Bill Clinton received a $15M advance in 2004 dollars.

It was a record at the time. So now she's at number 2 and her husband is at number one.

This seems to be making my point.

The problem is that people have long since figured out that a deal over drinks and a handshake is tough to prosecute, and easy to deny.

As long as no one is wearing a wire.

Even then it doesn't always help. See David Steiner's recorded statements on how he had corrupted things so much -- all to be waved away with a "I was just lying on that private phone call".

"that’s like asking why anyone would pay Beyoncé or the Beatles a million dollars just to play a few songs"

This almost feels like playing dumb. The fact that a legitimate public speaking economy exists and has a dynamic which is not based on payola does not mean that a dirtier side does not. Like other pieces of the money-in-politics puzzle there are legitimate, non-corrupt reasons to hand powerful people 6 figure checks for dropping by. The problem is that it also gives cover to the non-legitimate reasons.

Besides, Beyonce or the Beatles are/were either paid to perform shows (in which case, people except a large return from ticket prices), or are asked by some ultra-rich guy to perform at his party/whatever (in which case it's an extravagant spending).

How's that different than conference tickets to see a speaker or a corporation hiring a big name to speak at their event?

Beyoncé isn't just Beyoncé. Even when doing a private gig for a billionaire "she" is a huge event employing hundreds of people to install and operate a massive collection of sound, light and staging equipment. She, the person, may take a large fee but "she" the show is something very different than a politician giving a speech at a podium.

Hiring a politician to give a speech at your corporate retreat is like hiring Beyoncé to attend your birthday party and not sing. It may be physically possible, but horribly awkward and everyone outside the party will wonder what was actually going on.

Billionaires do pay well north of $250k to have actors just show up at their party and do a speech though. And Clinton or Trump are probably better, more audience-relevant speakers for certain audiences.

It's not like organizations with $225k to book a Hillary Clinton speaking engagement struggle for access to the government or like they don't have the willingness and ability to funnel money to her or her campaign in ways which don't involve paying market rate for a speaking engagement.

And when they do hire celebs to show up as eye candy they do so as demonstration of their influence and wealth. We on the outside know that Beyonce isn't at the birthday party for her wit. So when a Clinton, a Bush or any other political actor is paid to attend some corporate get-together they are on display as much as beyonce would be at some kid's birthday party. They don't give away any secrets or profound insights at these events. Those who brought the speaker are simply demonstrating their connections and spending power.

Ehh. Hilary Clinton is far more powerful than the people that invite her to give speeches. More than likely this is a way for a business interest to pay tribute in the hopes that someday she might remember their fealty.

Ummm, yes. A lot of people think that's a problem. That's called corruption. Do you not?

If that's corruption you'd have to disqualify every candidate who's ever had a job.

Sounds like a plan

> The rewards to attracting the right people in the corporate world can more than justify a six-figure speech. Hedge funds often invite potential clients to events featuring prominent speakers. As one hedge fund manager has explained, if just one client “decides to invest $10 million… the firm will snag a 2 percent management fee—which works out to $200,000” per year.

This on the other hand seems like a very legitimate explanation and parallels the logic behind paying speakers to attend large tech events (like one Salesforce might have, which is mentioned elsewhere in the article).

I guess I think that my point still stands. The existence of legitimate reasons does not rule out or make less likely illegitimate ones.

The main way I think this topic goes wrong is becoming a trial. In a trial you are looking for definite proof of unacceptable (and ideally illegal) misconduct. This is not a trial question, IMO. If you find out the girls have been in the boys room while at band camp, you can probably guess the reasons or at least the outcomes in a large enough portion of cases.

The system needs to be preventative. Elected officials in particular need to have no legal way of accepting this kind of money.

I wonder how much Trump could get paid to Tweet.

Occam's razor implies that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.

If you want an example of straight bribery, which is sufficiently far in the past to be non-partisan, try Rick Santorum with Accuweather.

Accuweather employees (mostly the head and his brother) donated $10,500 to his PAC and he subsequently introduced an Act trying to wall off the National Weather Service's data from the public domain.

What surprised me was how low the price tag was. These days, that barely covers a new Submariner.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Santorum#National_Weather...

As someone who worked at a company that hired HRC to speak, I can speak from experience. We were not buying influence. She was there to impress attendees (e.g., prospective and existing clients) with a speech and photo opps afterward -- same as the other speakers we brought in previously and after.

It's easy to see conspiracies from afar, but the reality -- at least our reality -- was mundane.

Unless you were the guy writing the check or were present for every phone call and closed door meeting, I'm not sure how you can claim this.

I can claim it because that's what my first-hand experience told me -- which is more experience than most. Even if I were in all meetings, you could say I wasn't inside the CEO's head.

Hiring a speaker for prestige and for influence are not mutually exclusive.

what about federal contracts that we have all been hearing about[1].

> What's more, the investigation revealed that many of the groups had federal contracts or lobbied the Clinton State Department. Some even had direct contact with Clinton or her top aides while she was secretary of state.

1. http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-04-22/heres-who-pai...

The point of a keynote speaker is to raise the stature of the event. That, in turn, helps fill seats with potential customers.

The clients, not the speaker, are the ones organisers are trying to influence. It stands, however, that said raising of stature comes from the implicit connection the audience is encouraged to make between the keynote speaker (in this case, a politician) and the organisers.

If that's the case, why not release the transcripts?

It's pretty clear speaking fees and donations to her foundation are just legal bribes.

Networking is one of the likliest reasons. A Clinton dinner at 10k per head will attract a certain kind of audience. The speech itself may not carry as much importance as the presence of other dignitaries, industrialists, upcomers, lobbyists and so forth.

+ People get to say: 'I saw so and so' + It establishes the cred of the audience, i.e. all the bankers can talk to clients about how they say/met so and so. + It's an indirect way to contribute to campaigns without it technically being a campaign donation + It's a form of buying favour + And yes - it attracts other people whom you might be interested in meeting with etc..

Has anybody here ever had her/his mind changed by a great overpaid speaker? I've seen a lot of speeches in my professional life, and the ones that stuck the most were usually from non-famous low-paid speakers. The more famous and accomplished (and American, actually) the speaker is, the more the speech would steer toward a self-eulogy of the person's work achievements. And it's boring.

It's a bit sad that most of the time this kind of talks are nothing more than marketing stunts for both the speakers and the conference organizers.

I don't know about changing my mind per se, but I definitely got a new perspective on financial regulation after attending a talk by Barney Frank (famous for the Dodd-Frank bill). I don't remember the exact details now, but hearing about how he designed the regulations was very interesting, even if it was a pretty high-level description. It colored my understanding of the regulation in a way that just reading a description on Wikipedia didn't.

Well, I won't call him a "famous speaker", not outside of a specific field (politics and finance). By famous I mean popular in a broader sense. On the tech side of things that would mean Steve Wozniak famous, so to say (famous for his contribution on a specific field, but broadly recognized as popular).

Who paid the bill for that talk?

I bet it wasn't Goldman & Sachs.

Look at their list of speakers. Russel Simmons, Deepak Chopra, Shaq. They invite all kinds of people. These are usually in the big offices in NY or London so most of the attendees are likely to be liberals.

What are you talking about? I'm asking specifically about Barney Frank to the author of the comment above.

I took your comment to mean that could not imagine GS paying for a liberal who championed financial regulation to come speak. I'm countering that they invite a wide array of speakers on a a variety of topcis, many of whom are liberal. I'm not sure if they have ever invites Frank, but it seems like something they definitely would do.

It was actually Jane Street, a quantitative trading firm. The talk was even more interesting because of the context, and because I was learning a lot about finance that whole summer.

> Has anybody here ever had her/his mind changed by a great overpaid speaker?

Overpaid speakers aren't there to change your mind, they're there to signal to you the high status of the institution that burnt a pile of cash to pay for them

(Is this the sentiment expressed in the original post? About to read it now)

You just reminded me of when I went to a conference and watched Daniel Libeskind talk about a work in progress. I get that famous individuals enjoy talking about their work but this was the first time I nearly suffocated from such an overbearing ego. Which I guess would've been fine if the specific work he was showing was profoundly influential or of high excellence? Instead it seemed like a certain distinct aesthetic that was persistent in different environments regardless of whether it fit the context.

To answer your original question, Helen Marriage (Artichoke) convinced me through her work the power that art can have in bringing together communities and fostering wonderment.

I've recently seen a talk from the world famous photographer chase jarvis. OMG, that was some huge amount of self promoting bullshit, interspersed with some incredibly dull lifecoaching advice. It was bad, really bad.

Heh, my experience with this guy as a consumer has been when he put out a camera app and started a community site, and after making a good buck, abandoned it all, with no updates, no handover of the app, etc.

http://www.chasejarvis.com/blog/the-best-camera-iphone-app-b...

A bit different, but I do find many college commencement speeches to be both humorous and enlightening. I'm particularly a fan of DFW's and Ben Bernanke's.

Indifferent about Steve Jobs', but plenty of people would purport to have their lives changed by this.

Each of them "could" be an overpaid speaker so I figured it's worth mentioning.

It's a legal way to baksheesh them! Nicolas Sarkozy then a random french president got payed over 200000 euros to give a 15mn speech at a Qatar based event. Qatar did really well in Business with the french since then. That's how it works!

Well this is exactly what fta is about. People also give this kind of money to famous non politicians.

Maybe because they influence the people who vote

>Well this is exactly what fta is about

No, tfa explicitly downplays this.

>People also give this kind of money to famous non politicians.

Only famous non-politicians have interesting and specific things to say (e.g. someone like Malcom Gladwell, etc). Few care what a politician has to say, after all they hear what they have to say all the time, in interviews, public statements, campaign speeches, etc.

>Only famous non-politicians have interesting and specific things to say (e.g. someone like Malcom Gladwell, etc)

Malcolm Gladwell is paid to be a presentable face for the tobacco, banking and pharma industries:

http://shameproject.com/profile/malcolm-gladwell-2/

AND also sells millions of books to people who just want to read what he says.

> In the case of politicians like Hillary Clinton, many observers see a more sinister explanation for how a speech can be worth $225,000: the speech is buying political influence.

> It’s impossible to say exactly how much the desire to influence politicians inflates their speaking fees.

Goldman is, as with all their investments, expecting a positive return. I'm not sure why this is presented as some kind of alternative theory.

Goldman does not need to actually influence Hillary. They only need to suggest the possibility, so their clients believe that Goldman has an advantage compared the competition.

They already received their positive return. By paying Hillary for her speeches, they blocked her from credibly moving to the left on financial reform to fend off Sanders.

Do we know who canceled Glass–Steagall?

And after it was removed, how much tax payers paid to GS and such in '08, what was the rough figure?

The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 repealed Glass-Steagall [1], in part to make a merger between Citicorp (a bank) and Travelers Group (an insurance company) legal.

Goldman Sachs did not win from it. They were on the "protected" side of Glass-Steagall's wall. Fees went down after JPMorgan and friends were allowed to throw their balance sheet around.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm–Leach–Bliley_Act

The point is Clinton canceled it. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass%E2%80%93Steagall_Legisla... )

And the answer is: over $7 trillion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_Economic_Stabilizati...

So yeah, $200k.

> And the answer is: over $7 trillion.

Only if you include monetary policy, directed by a Federal Reserve chairman appointed by George W. Bush, the same man who signed into law the bailout programme.

Goldman Sachs was far from the chief recipient of those funds and had to pay back the bail-out funds (at a profit to the U.S. government).

I gave a link with data that adds it up and how they added it up. You just gave your opinion.

This article is really about excusing Hillary Clinton isn't it?

By making absurd comparisons to pop-stars who can fill stadiums of paying concert goers.

America really needs to reign in its political class because it risks degenerating into a third-world country where corruption takes a big toll on the wealth of the whole society.

Selling off ambassador's posts for large sum political donations seems to be very well-documented. As is pay-to-play. And yet it seems like American media and populace are just accepting and/or ignoring this.

Do I think she bends the rules to make money/protect her ass? Yes.

Do I think she bends the rules less than the other guy? I don't know. Probally not?

On a side note, I will probally vote her. Why? Because I don't think Trump will raise tariffs, or can raise tariffs enough to "Make American great again."

That said, I remember, in the 90's, Hillary made close to $100,000 on a under $1000 futures contract. It was supposedly under the "guidance" of the head attorney for Tyson foods. I was in college at the fine, but remember being floored when I heard how much she made in one year. They were middle class Americans when she made that huge amount of money. It must have been a world record at the time?

We talked about it in class, and the instructor said, "I don't think I've ever met a successful investor that didn't get insider information. He said the wealthy/politicians are given preferential treatment. I remember he said Hillary should have been required to have an account of at least $12,000 in order to even play the future's contract she won on.

Anyways, I don't know a wealthy person who didn't cheat in their lives. The ones who claim it was luck/just hard work are in denial.

(I'm personally sick of wealthy people cheating the system. I can honestly state I have never met one that was completely honest. And then again, I most likely will vote for her. I don't want to go back to no insurance, and a bunch of conservative judges. Oh, yea, I remember reading a multiple studies where Supreme Court judges cannot be expected to vote line they did in the past once on that bench. Meaning--conservative judges sometimes ve one liberal ones. So, that isn't high on my radar.)

>Do I think she bends the rules less than the other guy? I don't know. Probally not?

Fool me once...

More excuses for why you support a corrupt candidate please.

This is how RMS has made a living for 2 decades. One advantage to attending these is being able to briefly talk to the speaker afterwards if they stick around, like asking RMS about his papers in the 1970s about propagation, dependencies and backtracking for building large-scale symbolic systems.

Don't people basically see this as a willing donation to RMS / FSF? (which reminds me that I need to make my FSF donation for the year)

Unless it has changed recently, RMS asks for all his fees to be paid, and does not ask for a fee but makes it clear that one is appreciated and that if no speaking fee is paid, he's essentially given the speech for free. My experience is that organisations and people inviting him to speak do pay him, but in the thousands of dollars, similarly to what you'd pay a high end consultant to spend a day or two to travel and work ; not high tens of thousand and certainly not hundreds of thousands dollars!

I meant "asks for all his expenses to be paid", not fees.

In the case of top politicians, it does look very much like a convenient legal way to pay them bribes and/or rewards for "good work".

This article does not really dispel that impression but rather strengthens it. It protests too much. Besides, there is a big difference between $225K for them and the $50K for the merely famous. Whereas $50K might well be the market rate for really inspirational and famous speakers, the additional $175K is for what exactly?

>>In the case of top politicians, it does look very much like a convenient legal way to pay them bribes and/or rewards for "good work".

Yeah, as far as I'm concerned it's the equivalent of paying someone $200,000 for a bag of rocks. Sure, it's a legal transaction, but everyone knows the real purpose behind it: as a way to trade favors.

Barney Frank was on Bill Maher show the other day and he said he gets money from Wall Street on speaking engagements. And he is literally the author of Dodd Frank. The reason he gets invited because he knows more about the context of the regulation that anyone else and can answer complex question. A rather mundane reason. But if you omit that part, you can easily construct a more nefarious narrative on how a Senator is invited by Wall Street to influence regulations. Most times life is mundane and conspiracy theories are just that

It attracts people to your event.

If you're paying $1,000/plate for some fundraiser, there's an expectation for something more than rubber chicken and a photo with representative so and so.

I am neither a liberal nor a conservative. I'm a libertarian, so I really don't want any of the major U.S. presidential candidates to win.

But some of my political friends in both the right and left have a phrase I was reminded of while reading this article. It's "Vox-splaining"

The idea is that certain news outlets or articles exist based on the premise that those dumb voters! What they really just need is a patient voice to educate them on things. Then they would have correct political opinions. This can lead to really bad journalism where the author spends a lot of time trying to explain something that really doesn't need explaining -- all in an effort to correct misconceptions that nobody really ever had in the first place.

Why do famous people get paid a bazillion bucks to speak? Why, because they're famous, of course! I just plowed through 2,000 words that basically says this in various ways.

Yes, people pay lots of money to be near famous folks. They also pay money for access to famous folks. They pay money to influence famous folks to do things they want. There is no forced choice between these three options, and all can (and probably do) co-exist at the same time in many famous-person speaking engagements.

Every person in a 1,000 person audience probably has a different reason why an expensive speaker is worth it (or not).

My point has nothing directly to do with the Clinton campaign. I'm saying that you can't explain away an appearance of impropriety. We don't need extra education to figure out that sometimes folks pay an Apollo 13 astronaut a lot of money to have him come hang out at their annual civic club meeting. And that education doesn't paint away the glaringly obvious conclusion that when the astronaut shows up, there are all sorts of things that happen with increased access. Even if nothing unethical or illegal happens, in some situations that access doesn't look so good.

So when Bernie asked why anybody would pay that much for a speaker, he was inviting people to come up with various reasons why they would pay that much. This is only logical because after all, the folks buying the speeches and listening to them are doing the same thing. They are asking themselves: how can I make my increased access to this famous person worth it to me? And they all have different answers.

The first rule of ethics is that if it looks bad, it is bad. The reason is because it opens up discussion to people speculating like this -- and this speculation harms the institutions that the famous people represent. I believe the principle is that you are supposed to put the institution you represent above your own desires.

Brazilian politicians have recently "discovered" the "benefits" of paid speeches too. A famous ex-president used to charge north of $200k USD saying that's what international speakers like Clinton charge, so he ought to be allowed to do the same. Evidence is mounting this was a venue for converting bribes into legal money, or to buy influence from the Brazilian state machine.

Funny anecdote: he was once paid such amount to speak to a audience of workers from a beer factory. After arriving, he basically drank a pint of beer in front of everyone, said some funny jokes and disappeared into the offices to discuss "business". That was a speech and he damn well charges what he wants for that, that was the explanation.

It amazes me that these people, having reached their peak in social influence and often in their bank accounts, can pretend to justify speeches as a revenue source. If they are so concerned with making the world a better place, they could charge just their expenses and maybe a modest fee to pay their bills. Hell, I'm sure most famous decent people would do it for free if it's really a good cause.

Completely agree, it feels bad, it smells bad... If you have any ethics, you know it's bad and you don't engage in such shenanigans.

I think if you listed the policy positions of the 4 top candidates with no names attached and asked a random sampling of people which was most corrupted by corporate cash, Gary Johnson would win by a mile. If this election has taught me one thing it's that money in politics is a non-issue. Proof is in the pudding. If Clinton is bought and paid for to be a liberal, then kudos to whoever bid highest. Johnson and Trump are willing to wreck the country free of charge.

I watched a documentary called Clinton Cash[1] that provided some correlations to explore, pertaining the Clintons' speaking fees.

1. https://youtu.be/7LYRUOd_QoM

Oh boy correlations, the lifeblood of the conspiracy theoriest

it's not what she/he speaks, it's that they become the honeypot for the event, so the event can get larger attention/influence(fame, money, publicity,etc).

My first thought was that someone didn't tell Priceonomics about how attempting to be a policitical influencer runs counter to the goal of being seen as an intelligent source of independent thought... I had thought that was their brand. They really come off as dumb and naive here.

But then I thought, maybe they're interested in getting into the Think Tank game. This might be a sort of tryout.

I like to look at these things from the other side. Say you're a high-level politician and/or civil servant and want to find a way for somebody to pay you off for granting them political favors. What would you do? Paid speeches sound great. Hire a speechwriter for a few thousand bucks, then you just go and give it to them and collect your fee. That fee can be whatever you want, because who can say what a speech is really worth? Beats the pants off of running a charity for your benefactors to donate to, where it has to at least look like a decent amount of the money is going to some worthy cause. You can do whatever you feel like with your speaking fees. Your benefactors don't get to write off their payoffs as charitable donations, but that's hardly your problem.

I can't prove that that's how it happened, of course. But isn't that part of the appeal of the scheme? Who could ever prove that it was or wasn't a payoff in disguise?

It's like the conflict of interest thing. It's best to just not do it, as least while you're active in government and have the ability to subtly grant favors. Even if it's completely fair, standard, and on the level, it still looks dirty, you can never satisfactorily prove that it isn't dirty, and you waste a ton of time arguing about it, which just serves to cement in peoples' minds the notion that you are dirty.

Some people go to great lengths to try to avoid something that would even appear to be a conflict of interest. Others couldn't even be bothered to cross the street if it inconvenienced them.

Here are some things that could be investigated, probably the same way one would use data science for fraud detection:

- Compile a broad database of speakers, fees they received, when it happened

- Find a way to rate speakers based on their public visibility. In other words, who attracts an audience more than someone else. Conceivably, the value of a "Speaker" is to get people to show up to your event and pay to be there.

- Create a network database of relationships of speakers and family members.

- Start looking for anomalies related to outsized speaking fees and changes when a family member is or is not holding a public office.

- From that, investigators would need to start looking in to the details of who may have done what for who

Despite what is read in the press, Western countries are moving hard against public corruption and perceived corruption and have since the post-9/11 anti-money laundering changes.

Do they give a discount for speaking gigs in/around their hometown? It seems like 90+% of the "work" (and certainly the time) involved in most of the out-of-town speaking gigs would be traveling to and from them, rather than the actual speaking.

I give a lot of talks, and coming up with engaging content and organizing it, often with visual aids (though I realize many of these extremely highly paid people don't use those; but I will say that having engaging material without visuals is even harder....), is enormously time consuming. The time I spend traveling is meanwhile relatively meaningless. To compare: thing of a stand up comedian, and ask yourself if 90% of their "work" is driving to the venue.

Sure, but the time spent creating the talk content is amortized over all the times it's given. I doubt most of the speakers listed in the article are creating custom talks for each speaking gig they're hired for. (From the article: "A $20,000 to $200,000 check may or may not buy a customized speech.") In my experience, if I can repeat (or mostly rehash/remix) previous talk(s) I've given, the marginal cost of giving another one is ~3 hours for one in my area vs. 1-3 full days for out of town.

The real question is how often you can give the same talk (possibly with slight variations) in different locations, because each performance of the same speech amortizes the time cost to prepare it initially.

Don't sell yourself by the hour. Sell by value.

But 'time is money' is even truer for busy famous people like these than for typical hourly wage earners. If demand were infinite, they could probably do something like 5x as many in town speaking gigs as out of town ones, and still have more downtime. And when not speaking/traveling I'm sure they have any number of things they'd rather be doing.

Perhaps I phrased this suboptimally by asking about a "discount". Maybe a better question would be, is there a surcharge for the travel time required for out of town gigs?

It's kind of a shame that this article devolves into political discussion, as that is the least interesting aspect of the thing.

Public speaking is hard af, and being even decent at it pays dividends.

When the same person who gets 250'000 for a single gig regularly performs for free for other audiences, something is fishy.

We are bound to our own ignorance and gullibility when we accept bribery as a cost that all free people can bear.

They don't. They get paid to push a policy, the speech is just a legal way to compensate them.

Because Americans worship celebrities and bribe their politicians.

When a common man does it, it's called bribery. When a lobbyist does it, it's a great law.

Most of the people listed in this article aren't politicians, and so can't enact any laws. And even when they are politicians, it looks like they are almost always retired politicians, who can't enact any laws.

Some of them are even counter-establishment figures like satirists and even hackers (in the security sense).

Hillary Clinton is a prominent example, but the article's explanation is that she is invited as a retired secretary of state, as other retired secretaries of state have been, rather than as a current presidential candidate, which seems reasonable.

'it's a great law' doesn't even make sense in your sentence. What's a great law? Bribing people? Bribing people isn't lawful.

Only amateurs bribe any more. Professionals negatively bribe: They sponsor the whole show and just stop giving you money once you oppose.

You'd be surprised.

The distinction you make exists, but it's not about amateurs vs professionals, but obviously about those that can afford it (to "sponsor the whole show") and those who don't.

Smaller businesses and interest groups pay their way into laws the traditional bride way all the time.

> she is invited as a retired secretary of state, as other retired secretaries of state have been, rather than as a current presidential candidate

Did she leave the part of her that was a future (at the time) presidential candidate at home?

> That seems reasonable?

Yes it does to me. If they invite many former secretaries of state it seems reasonable to invite this one. Who cares what she's currently working on if that's not why she was invited? The article even says she hardly mentioned her candidacy.

If you're desperate to get worked up about this I can see where you would find the problem, but I think a charitable interpretation is a former secretary of state was invited to talk like many others were.

> a charitable interpretation

Indeed.

If you trust her, you may not see a problem, but if you don't trust her, it's easy to argue this is disguised bribery.

There's a huge difference between a former secretary of state with no prospects of power in the future and someone everyone knew would run for President in a few years.

It's a conflict of interest wether you trust her or not.

It's a very thin line, this game.

Clinton should have recused herself from all Clinton Global Initiative issues a long time ago.

The massive Clinton fund with millions in donations from all sorts of political actors, mostly in nefarious places, is worse than Trump's excuses for not releasing his taxes (which he should definitely do).

Simple conflicts of interest revealed in a one minute Google search:

A) Matt Lauer, Tom Brokaw, Anderson Cooper, Fareed Zakaria, Katie Couric - and many others - are all members of the press who are supposed to objectively vet candidates, and who will/have moderated political debates, were previously listed as a 'Notable Members' the Clinton Foundation. [1]

B) More than 1/2 of the private entities she met with while Sec of State donated to her Fund - total over $50M. Foreign governments with whom she dealt with directly gave her fund over $170M - this is just the first 1/2 of her term. That's a serious conflict of interest. "Her calendars and emails released as recently as this week describe scores of contacts she (Clinton, as Sec. State) and her top aides (again government officials) had with foundation donors." [2]

C) Clinton put someone on a government board (security related) - who had no experience in the field. [3]

It's a long list.

[1] http://www.mediaite.com/online/flashback-matt-lauer-was-list...

[2] http://www.bigstory.ap.org/article/82df550e1ec646098b434f7d5...

[3] http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/clinton-donor-sensitive-intel...

I would invite anyone who down-voted that comment to explain how receiving money (millions of USD) for a personal fund, while at the same time providing government services and favours for donors - as a civil servant - is not a very serious conflict of interest.

Sure its easy to argue if you're not one to need evidence to form opinions, but mere possibilities.

There's more than enough evidence that she used her influence to help people who gave her money, too much to list here, so here's one extreme example:

> a major Clinton Foundation donor was placed on a sensitive government intelligence advisory board even though he had no obvious experience in the field

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/clinton-donor-sensitive-intel...

Yeah I've seen that before. It's really not that interesting. The intelligence board was about nuclear proliferation and they were expanding to include folks with a wider range of skills (rather than just nuclear/political experts). His technology expertise fits what they were after.

His expertise in high-frequency trading?

How was that related to nuclear proliferation?

In the technology that enables HFT, sure. And like I said, they were expanding their expertise beyond nuclear proliferation experts. Having experts in other areas is valuable. Surely you're aware that the intersection of networking technology and nuclear concerns is non-empty.

Is it? Please explain.

And while you're at it, could you also explain why a lawyer, who rose to prominence as Bill Clinton's defense attorney, was the one choosing networking experts for a nuclear proliferation committee?

The point that you seemed to miss was that concerns regarding network availability in the event of a nuclear attack was what prompted the development of the internet. And so networking technology is an important concern when it comes to nuclear issues.

I'm not sure it matters who is doing the choosing. It's rarely an objective process that selects members for committees like this, rather just a matter of who you know and being in the right place at the right time.

The board's role has nothing to do with preparing the Internet for a nuclear attack.

> The Secretary of State's International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) provides the Department with independent insight and advice on all aspects of arms control, disarmament, nonproliferation, international security, and related aspects of public diplomacy

http://www.state.gov/t/avc/isab/index.htm

Please explain how high frequency trading relates to "arms control, disarmament, nonproliferation, international security, and related aspects of public diplomacy".

As I referred to multiple times, they were expanding to include other expertise besides nuclear and political. What about that don't you get? Unless you want to argue that even with this expanded scope he was not qualified, you're just blowing hot air.

That's the board's description now.

He was appointed in 2011.

I think you just made up this mythical expansion to include other expertise, or you're trusting a cover story someone else invented, because the board's role doesn't seem to have actually expanded.

> Board members are national security experts with scientific, military, diplomatic, and political backgrounds

Strange that they don't mention trading, or networks, or even finance or technology.

But let me give you the benefit of the doubt. If they were looking for his expertise, they must have looked for someone else with that expertise after the scandal. Who did they find instead of him?

" Who cares what she's currently working on if that's not why she was invited?"

Because if you receive piles of money while running for president, and then pass on favours after getting it, we call that 'bribery'.

I don't want to sound mean spirited, but your position is incredibly naive.

That she is running for president is extremely relevant.

Same for all politicos.

> Same for all politicos.

OK, so why are such articles only written for hillary? Why are you so adamantly opposed to Hillary's practices when it is so incredibly common. How much of all this is about corruption and how much is it about bullying females?

Because Hillary Clinton:

A) Is running for President B) Is married to an ex-President, and the most influential man in the world. C) Has a $500M slush-fund into which money from nefarious places is being invested - and it's not controlled by campaign spending laws. D) Money was given to her from individuals (more than 50% of them) that she was dealing with as Sec of State - which is a massive conflict of interest on it's own, and she did give many favours that we know about, and it's just the top of the iceberg. E) She was brought up in the article. F) Is probably the highest paid circuit speaker in the world, or was, up until recently.

None of the above is true for anyone else.

That's why.

As far are your 'picking on women' bit ... oh please, this kind of argument makes my skin crawl. Corruption can't hide behind panties, at least outside of campus 'safe zones' where the facts don't matter. 'But she's a girl' is not an argument.

What is this slush fund? Who gave her money when she was Sec of State? Please substantiate these assertions.

The Clinton Foundation is a slush fund. I spent a higher percentage of my income on actual charity than they have in recent years.

You've spent over 88% of your income[1] on charity? That's awesome, keep up the good work!

[1] https://www.charitywatch.org/ratings-and-metrics/bill-hillar...

Ha ha ... the Clinton Foundation is an 'operating foundation' - which means it doesn't give it's money away like other charities. So - if this was like the 'Christian Children's Fund' - than that 88% would be 88% of the money goes to Haiti or wherever, with 12% overhead.

The 'Clinton Fund' doesn't give any money away, the operate their own missions and programs - meaning that - of that 88% , any amount can go to 'consultants' 'lawyers' 'research' 'friends' 'conferences' etc.. And it does. That's a lot of money to spend - and 100% of those people work directly for Clinton Corp..

The Clinton Foundation is supposed to be a charity but they spend almost nothing on charity - their expenses are 'conferences', trips, meetings - basically Bill and Hillary's personal expense account for things they cannot bill to the government or some other sponsor. Also, they can make ads that promote 'narrative' and the 'personal brand' of Hillary.

Can you provide evidence for these claims?

Ask Haitians what they think of the Clinton Foundation:

> High Hopes for Hillary Clinton, Then Disappointment in Haiti

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/15/us/politics/hillary-clinto...

Can you point to the part of that article that offers any concrete evidence of wrongdoing?

> Fewer than half the jobs promised at the industrial park, built after 366 farmers were evicted from their lands, have materialized. Many millions of dollars earmarked for relief efforts have yet to be spent [six years later]. Mrs. Clinton’s brother Tony Rodham has turned up in business ventures on the island

Which of those appears to be concrete proof of wrongdoing to you? Is there any evidence that her brother benefited from the Foundation's actions? All I see are insinuations.

Millions of dollars donated for Haiti disaster relief weren't spent on disaster relief.

That doesn't seem like wrongdoing to you?

Not unless it is shown that it was spent on some other expense. Haiti was uniformly difficult for a wide range of charities.

>OK, so why are such articles only written for hillary?

As opposed to who? Trump? Aren't enough negative articles also written for Trump? Besides he is so rich that he doesn't needed "meagre" 250K speeches to influence him -- he probably has voting favors for his business partners and his own business interests pre-planned already.

>Why are you so adamantly opposed to Hillary's practices when it is so incredibly common.

Because even if another 100,000 politicians do it, she's the one who'll be probably sitting in the White House...

You'd rather people prioritize criticizing some second rate senator from Alabama or South Dakota, or the potential next President?

>How much of all this is about corruption and how much is it about bullying females?

The latter none at all? Else we'd see it for other female politicians too.

Wow that is world-class naiveté. Female politicians of every stripe are bullied daily. This is business as usual for half of our population. And its compounded by guys constantly replying "Hey it isn't happening to me; I don't see it so it must not exist".

Clinton is being treated far more kindly than Trump.

What universe is that happening in? There have been around 50 smoke-screen fake 'scandals' invented around Hillary in particular. None have come to anything. Millions mis-spent in tax money on what amounts to political slander.

Such as?

Hillary's emails? Potential mishandling of classified information, violations of record keeping laws, and perjury. That's significant, and has nothing to do with her gender.

Which investigation do you think was mere bullying and not about something significant?

I think some commenters here talk as Hilary supporters.

I, on the other hand, could not care less for either candidate, I'm not voting there anyway.

That one, like all the others, was investigated and nothing turned up. To keep repeating those refuted claims is more of the smokescreen. Key word of a smokescreen: "Potential" You can imply something was done wrong with no evidence.

I don't see politicians as male or female and could not care less what sex they are. Are they fit for office is the real question.

Female politicians are just hit with some special charges related to their sex. But male and female politicians are hit with all kinds of shit all the time. Compared to the avalanche of accusations that go to both, having some special accusations because you're a woman politician is not much. Plus, in the current PC climate, most respected outlets don't do that at all -- it's down to the "yellow press" so to speak to do that.

(Besides most, if not all, deserve to be called all kinds of shit anyway, as they are crappy politicians, male or female).

Convenient to ignore the abuse heaped on female politicians (hell any professional) daily. Again, denial that there's a whole special category of female-bashing is not an argument. I recommend reading up on it.

"Convenient to ignore the abuse heaped on female politicians (hell any professional) daily. "

Get of of HN and back to Jezebel.

The position that females face 'bullying' every day in business and politics is beyond false. It's that kind of rubbish narrative that drives otherwise normal people to vote for a crazy person like Trump.

"Most of the people listed in this article aren't politicians, and so can't enact any laws. "

They are connected individuals who will provide introductions, lobbying and favours for the people paying for the speech.

"but the article's explanation is that she is invited as a retired secretary of state, as other retired secretaries of state have been, rather than as a current presidential candidate, which seems reasonable."

This is really a little naive.

Hillary Clinton is running for Pres with a 70% chance of getting it, her husband is the #1 most connected man in the world.

Over 50% of the private entities she met while Sec of State donated to the Clinton slush fund, to the tune of over $57 million dollars.

It's a form of soft corruption - 100%.

A $250K 'speaking fee' is just another way to transfer money from an org, to a political entity.

A 'donation' to the Clinton Global Initiative is simply a donation to the de-facto Clinton PAC/fund.

It's a form of corruption and it's not a secret. You don't donate to Clinton fund - then get an introduction/favour by Clinton by accident.

I'm singling out Clinton because you did, but it's the same across the board.

It's called a bribe, folks.

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