America, Compromised: Lawrence Lessig Explains Corruption | Hacker News Reader

America, Compromised: Lawrence Lessig Explains Corruption

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123 pointspdkl9587 comments

Anyone who thinks America doesn't have a lot of corruption doesn't understand how the world works.

I've been driving around Africa for 2 years now, and at least here it's always really blatant and clear.

> at least here it's always really blatant and clear

Because there is more of it.

No. It's because it happens face to face between regular people on the street. i.e. me and a military man holding an AK 47.

In America, it happens behind closed doors in boardrooms and offices.

'Unlimited Campaign Contributions' is nothing more than newspeak for corruption. By very definition, it is about paying a person in a position of power to make a decision that is in your favor.

> 'Unlimited Campaign Contributions' is nothing more than newspeak for corruption. By very definition, it is about paying a person in a position of power to make a decision that is in your favor.

You are equating two different things. One, giving a politician money they can spend on personal luxuries for a political favor. Two, giving a strictly-regulated campaign money it can spend on advertising, political functions, et cetera, or less-regulated PACs.

Personal versus political benefits is one major diffference. Prevalence, and the necessity of engaging with corrupt organs to survive and thrive, is another.

Claiming corruption in America even rivals most of the world is unsubstantiated. The inverse is well substantiated.

Must disagree. If you have money it is easier to find equality/justice. My favorite example: If you can afford it, you can get a license plate expressing your support for the state police (or your state bird). You can add to that fraternal order decals further expressing your support for the police. Does your willingness and ability to purchase those things make you MORE or LESS likely to receive special treatment during a traffic stop than someone without the ability to do so. Think about this.

Have you ever spoken to a police officer? I've worked with several, I've served on a borough council and a civil service commission, I've been contracted out to regional and state law enforcement agencies.

Nobody cares about the little sticker you put on your license plate. It's a $5 fundraiser. In my state I think the non-LEO license plates you're talking about are an extra $30 or $40 on top of your normal registration fees.

The only thing I've ever heard having any affect like what you're implying are the "police courtesy cards," PBA/FOP cards, whatever they're called in your state. And I haven't heard of them actually preventing any punishment, just incurring more of it.

If governments were serious about preventing corruption, they would have outlawed all those fake police badges and vanity license plates.

The only purpose they can serve is to corrupt.

Why would you hear about the cases of PBA/FOP cards preventing punishment?

The whole point of those interactions is to not talk about what happened.

Small gifts can have a big effect. There’s a reason drug reps always want to buy doctors lunches. It’s not for charity: that low double-digit “gift” pays for itself. And the out-the-door cost is $hundreds.

What I meant was I know people who have PBA/FOP cards, have tried to use them, and have gotten a tongue lashing in response in conjunction with no leniency at all. The only ones I've heard of ever working as intended are the courtesy cards for immediate family, and the general consensus is that dealing with your State Trooper father that night is as bad or worse than a $300 speeding ticket.

I don't see a meaningful difference between personal and political spending here. If I can pay a politician to enact a policy I want, perhaps to the detriment of his constituency or society at large, what do I care if he goes on to spend that money on sports cars or his campaign to retain office? As far as I'm concerned it's quid pro quo either way.

This might be pedantic, but legally speaking, if you were to "pay a politician" for voting a certain way, it would be highly illegal. "quid pro quo", on a campaign contribution or a porsche or a briefcase of cash is all illegal.

IMO, lobbying is legalized bribing, so too me, lobbying is paying a politician to vote or do as you ask.

> lobbying is legalized bribing

So when I call my elected leaders to voice up about an issue, that's bribery? Because what I'm doing is lobbying. Or, if I call my elected leader and patch in a friend in another state who's more knowledgeable about the domain, is that lobbying?

If it's not, then what if my friend and I both patch in an out-of-district friend? What if we form a formal club? If we want (a) freedom of political speech and (b) freedom of political assembly, it gets really hard to separate a grassroots interest group from a destructive commercial one. (And should civic interests always trump commercial interests? That's a political question, too!)

TL; DR Democracy can't exist without lobbying. With respect to paid lobbying, I might agree, but the devil's in the details.

You aren't taking into account causality.

"Here's a sports car for you if you vote the way I like on this issue": this suggests that the sports car bought the vote, and so is indicative of corruption.

"I like your position on this issue, here's some money for your campaign to help you get elected, and that can only be spent for that": this suggests that the position is the cause of the money, not the other way around, and so is not indicative of corruption.

> Personal versus political benefits is one major diffference. Prevalence, and the necessity of engaging with corrupt organs to survive and thrive, is another.

The political benefits beget personal benefits. That's the point.

They are both corruption under two different names, no matter how you prevaricate.

Alice runs for office, saying she supports certain positions and policies and will work toward them if elected.

Bob, who agrees with those policies and positions, gives a large donation to Alice's campaign.

Alice wins, and works toward those positions and policies.

Are you saying Alice is corrupt because her campaign took money from someone who agreed with her stated positions?

To substantiate your point about campaign accounts: U.S. Representative Duncan Hunter is currently under indictment for spending campaign money on personal wants: http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-duncan-hunter-poll...

Let's not forget how many politicians, after receiving 'legal' campaign dollars while or before their time in office end up in lucrative sinecures after leaving their elected positions. While they technically weren't bribed by today's myopically narrow interpretation of the crime, I would say this arrangement reeks of corruption to most.

There's also the personal utility view of this - if it is power they desire and you finance their acquisition of power, isn't that in a sense bribery? If they want power, why buy them a sports car....

It's clear to me that we need real campaign finance reform. No more dark money or third party political action committees. The fate of our democracy probably depends on it.

Just look at some of the former presidents in the US and what they are paid for speeches for book deals.

These enormous sums are far outside the normal. It reeks corruption.

> You are equating two different things. One, giving a politician money they can spend on personal luxuries for a political favor. Two, giving a strictly-regulated campaign money it can spend on advertising, political functions, et cetera, or less-regulated PACs.

You forgot to add "for political favor" on the end of the third sentence.

I don't care how they're spending it, they're being given it because the person doing the giving wants a decision made in their favor. That's the very definition of bribery and corruption.

i.e. High Mr. Politician. I will give you $600,000 in "campaign contributions" so long as you vote against this particular thing that would be very inconvenient to my profits.

Africa has both, so the face to face corruption in no way supersedes the more wide scale corruption.

"By very definition, it is about paying a person in a position of power to make a decision that is in your favor."

Why do you think that is? Is it Ideology? Or is it just profitable to get that decision in their favor?

> No. It's because it happens face to face between regular people on the street. i.e. me and a military man holding an AK 47. > >In America, it happens behind closed doors in boardrooms and offices.

Your comment makes no sense at all. Do you believe that in the land where military men carrying AK47 overtly demand bribes you don't see any corruption happening behind closed doors?

In fact, the only reasonable take from your observation is that there might be corruption in the US but at least society is effective at shutting down corruption by lowly law enforcement officers.

> me and a military man holding an AK 47

Sounds blatantly clear to me.

There's more low-level corruption, which makes the existence of corruption generally more obvious to your man on the street.

Whether there is more corruption in Africa or the United States probably depends on qualifying statements like "Where in Africa?", "Where in the United States?", and importantly "What constitutes corruption?"

The United States and Africa are both enormous land masses. While the United States is nominally a single country, it has enormous differences in culture from region to region, and even between different populations in the same region. Africa has lots of different countries, climates, cultures, etc. "There is more corruption in Africa than the United States" is too general a statement to be meaningful.

You can make meaningful, specific statements about the corruption in each place. I've never been to Africa, but two glaring and public examples of what I would call corruption in the United States from recent years are:

- the current President openly patronizes his own businesses using public funds, in what appears to be a clear violation of emoluments laws. The parts of the government responsible for ensuring the executive branch follows these laws have failed to engage in oversight or curtail this practice in any meaningful way.

- law enforcement officials routinely take property from individuals (under the widely adopted practice of civil asset forfeiture) without charging the individuals with any crime, in what appears to be a clear violation of the fourth amendment of the constitution.

There is corruption in America. It is really blatant and clear. The extent to which you experience it may vary, but at a minimum, reasonable people have to agree that it exists, and it exists right on the surface for everyone to see.

Despite that refreshing clarity, when corruption is overt and blatant, it becomes even more entrenched and damaging. It's hard to muster even local, contingent alliances against it.

A society that aspirationally pretends it has less corruption than it really does can often better contain corruption. The magnitude and practices of corruption can be confined to certain sectors & ritualized, obscured mechanisms – and its expansion checked with a surviving norm that "here, we don't do that".

What is common about their corruption and ours that you notice?

Anyone who thinks corruption in the USA (or Western Europe) is the same as a third world country hasn't really lived in a third world country. It's literally a whole new level - right from getting a driver's license to being forced to sell your home because local goon wants to build something on your land to entire judiciary blatantly ruling in favor of the one who pays the most to politicians running the county in spite of multiple stints in prison....I can go on and on.

There is a reason why the masses are clamoring to get to EU or USA, immigration hurdles notwithstanding. And clean governance without much hassle to your daily life is a big part of it.

Yeah corruption is weird in the US, I live in Arizona, I see adverts paid by the monopoly utility where police and fire fighters in uniform declare themselves against some environmental measure.

Will they retaliate against the zones that don’t vote their way?

Yes.

The recent tax bill was a good example. It was constructed to inflict the most pain on blue states.

How much should the federal government subsidize the continued gentrification, inequality and inflation in home prices? On the one hand liberals decry inequality. On the other hand they rage against tax reform that made it MORE costly for wealthy homeowners to create regions where housing is less available and affordable. If you don't understand this, then you don't understand the recent tax bill.

My post didn't say a whole hell of a lot, yet it seems to have triggered you quite a bit. Ask yourself why that is.

In response, I would just say that, yes, I do understand the recent tax bill. At it's core, it's part of a long term plan to reduce government by starving it for money, at the same time it is a giveaway to large campaign donors. These are not speculation, but directly acknowledged by the spineless and craven Speaker of the House Rep. Paul Ryan.

I know I don't really understand the most recent tax bill but I've heard that red states will get more of the benefit from the changes in it. Is that not true or is there a good reason for it?

It's not so much benefit but less pain. There are many changes, but one of the most significant is the removal of the deduction for state taxes paid.

Blue states tend to spend a lot more money on government services, especially education. This makes the taxes higher, but it was evened out somewhat by a reduction in federal tax burden. With that gone, it adds a lot more pressure to tax payers in states with higher property taxes. Those states tend to be blue. When evaluating the wisdom of this change, keep in mind that those states also tend to be net payers into the federal system, while red states tend to be net takers from the federal system. There are exceptions but the trend is clear.

Considering the tax bill is yet more theft from blue states (you know, the states that actually create most of the wealth) and gifts to red states, this is kind of laughable.

Is that true? Don't blue states tend to have a lot of people with low 6-figure incomes? Didn't all such people get a substantial cut in their effective tax rate?

Nope. Those same states have high state taxes, which the tax package made non-deductible.

Blue states tend to have higher income or property taxes to pay for the social services they provide. That has always (literally, since income tax was first enacted) been tax-deductible on the Federal level. That deduction was removed as part of the recent tax bill.

The deduction wasn't eliminated, it was capped. Because the standard deduction was increased, most people aren't worse off but people not just in blue states but in blue cities, where property values are much higher, are worse off.

I care less about this and more about the fact that the federal government isn't bringing in enough revenue to cover its responsibilities.

> I care less about this and more about the fact that the federal government isn't bringing in enough revenue to cover its responsibilities.

The cynic on me thinks this is by design. It's much easier to press for the removal of programs when you can point towards how we're continuously unable to avoid a deficit because of them...

That "strategy" hasn't ever worked before - at least, it has not resulted in significant numbers of programs being cut. (Or, rather, it hasn't resulted in significant dollars worth of programs being cut.)

I don't know if that's true or not, that it has never worked. When the amount budgeted to a program is not increased to cover the increased cost achieve what it's meant to achieve (e.g. pay for the medical coverage of the poor and disabled), that is effectively a cut.

And Mitch McConnell is talking about making cuts to the big three social insurance programs to address deficits [0]. This comes after he championed and passed major reductions in tax revenue last year, to the benefit primarily of corporations and the very wealthy.

[0] https://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/mcconnell-calls-for-cutting...

Fine, McConnell is talking. A lot of people have talked, over a lot of years. Let me know when actual cuts to actual budgets happen.

I would rather those actual cuts not take place at all. Just because politicians like Paul Ryan haven't succeeded in their goals doesn't mean they aren't real.

Certainly the popularity of the social insurance programs makes politicians, regardless of party, wary of cutting them but I expect that there have been cases where a bill with cuts has passed the House but failed in the Senate only because the need to get 60 votes to avoid a filibuster.

To the Republicans in power, tax cuts are always good in their own right but this secondary effect is also desirable.

I still don't really see why the elimination of this deduction was seen as unfair - and I live in California. Why should contributions to one's own State be subsidized by the Federal government via a tax cut? It doesn't seem right that I get to get out of paying federal taxes for the rest of the nation (which is, on average, poorer than California) by paying taxes to my own State. On the whole, this makes the tax structure more progressive, which I always thought was something liberals like.

What's more progressive, public schools (benefit everyone) or private schools (benefit the rich)?

Now consider that the tax bill makes private school tuition tax deductible, but state taxes that pay for public school non-deductible. Hardly progressive.

You're missing the point: why should I get a tax break for funding my rich neighborhood, at the expense of the rest of the country's neighborhoods (most of which are almost certainly worse off than mine)?

The addition of other subsidies is orthogonal to the capping of the state and local tax deduction.

> The addition of other subsidies is orthogonal to the capping of the state and local tax deduction.

No, the context is important. The republicans would look a lot less hypocritical if they also capped tuition deductions, church donation deductions, etc, because the services those fund overlap a lot with what state taxes fund.

As it is, the tax bill largely looks like a trampling of states rights to determine their own taxes, and a pushing of the conservative model of "private schools are better than public schools", "homeless shelters should be run by churches, not by the state" etc.

Saying the federal government "subsidizes" contributions seems backwards to me. The state takes its cut (being more local, they provide more services, etc, they should get first off the top). Then the Federal system takes their cut of what's left. Avoidance of double taxation is a long standing principle of taxes.

And if other parts of the country are poorer, the Federal government should address that by its outlays, which it does:

https://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the...

Blue states have a higher concentration of wealth. I thought high taxes on the wealthy is what we want?

Read how it impacted the upper middle class but only in Blue states, by reducing/eliminating federal deductions for state income tax.

Yeah, but the states with no state income tax usually have high property taxes that are also capped in terms of deductions, no?

> Lessig lays out the historic case for the Framers' understanding of corruption as a systemic phenomenon, in which the structure of institutions demand that even the best, most moral people sacrifice their principles to thrive (or just survive)

One of the most annoying aspects of social discourse right now is that everyone is redefining words and very few people have a common meaning for important words. Lessig's definition of corruption is different than my definition and different than the legal definition. I see this happening all over the place "hate speech" is also a good example every time I have a conversation or read an article about "hate speech" the definition has changed.

How are we supposed to have civil discourse when the meanings of words are constantly shifting?

The evolution of language has never not been a thing. Part of having a civil discourse is keeping up with evolving societal definitions.

Maybe technology is speeding that evolution, given the rate at which we're able to converse, you could convince me it's more difficult to keep up with the evolution today than it has historically been.

tenpoundhammer isn't talking about the normal evolution of language, but rather about people trying to change the definitions of words to make their positions seem more reasonable/acceptable. That also is not a new thing, but it's different from "the evolution of language".

Your comment and quote are almost completely unrelated. What on earth are you getting at?

I thought it was pretty obvious. tenpoundhammer's claim is that Lessig is using a nonstandard definition of "corruption" in order to make his argument work.

> How are we supposed to have civil discourse when the meanings of words are constantly shifting?

We aren't. To some parties, that's the whole point of doing it. I don't think that's what's happening here, though. He isn't changing the meaning of the word. He's contradicting a previous re-definition of the word by restoring the traditional meaning.

from TFA:

> The courts and their ideological backers -- the Chicago School economists who used shitty math to prove that greed is good and that corruption consists solely of direct quid-pro-quo bribery -- have served as enablers and even cheerleaders for this new Gilded Age, celebrating anonymous political cash contributions as a form of speech protected under the First Amendment and arguing that the Framers of the Constitution would have agreed wholeheartedly with them.

> Lessig walks a fine line between academic and activist as he rebuts this argument...

Ad for a book, albeit seems like it _could_ be a fun and even potentially a good read. this is still an ad for a book.

a review would have been nicer rather then simply stating Chicago School is evil and setting up for the foundation of his argument. If this is suppose to read asd a review for some reason it feels like it is missing something that I cannot put my finger on yet.

"...the Chicago School economists who used shitty math to prove that greed is good and that corruption consists solely of direct quid-pro-quo bribery..."

Yea, I stopped there. Interested in other's reactions though.

That one was a doozy, but this was the final straw for me:

> Lessig walks a fine line between academic and activist

Society doesn't need (and can't afford) more people conflating activism and academy.

Many of the greatest minds of the academy of the last 3 centuries were active in politics.

Montesquieu, Burke, etc...

Academic ideas renew society.

Chomsky

Also Einstein and Szilárd.

Conflating would be calling an activist an academic because they wrote a paper once, or calling an academic an activist because they have opinions. Saying that Lessig is right between the two without going full bore into one or the other seems like a pretty apt description. And from his Wikipedia page:

> Lester Lawrence Lessig III is an American academic, attorney, and political activist.

So it's pretty clear that he's both.

I think my point was poorly phrased, so the replies all (understandably) missed my point, which was roughly: there are lots of "academics" whose "research" is purely political/ideological activism and they're eroding the public trust in the academy generally. I'm specifically thinking of the folks who push climate change denialism or basically anyone in the grievance studies departments. In modern times, activist/academics more often than not seem to be these sorts of imposters (maybe I'm biased by relatively few 'squeaky wheels' and there are lots of legit academics/activists?).

Others have rightly pointed out that there have been many examples of academics who were also activists, and you're pointing out that Lessig is an academic on paper (as are the "academics" I referenced in the previous paragraph, although Lessig may be legitimate). Both of these are valid, correct observations, but they miss my point (which isn't to say that my point is good; only that it survives these observations! :) ).

Funny, becaused that's when I knew it was worth continuing to read.

it's boingboing ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

take their snark in stride — focus on the big picture

I agree - there's not much of a springboard for discussion here. A lot of fantastic articles are excerpts from books and a lot of fascinating interviews come from books, but this is just a very thin summary of an interesting sounding book.

I grew up a huge fan of Mr. Lessig, his views, and his works... however, in the past few years, I've seen him repeatedly attack the concept of the Electoral College, and this has made me cautious of his views going forward.

Mr. Lessig and I were both born in the same place: Rapid City, South Dakota. Mr. Lessig hasn't lived here in a long time to my understanding, but I've lived here for most of my life. If the Electoral College were to be "abolished," South Dakota and basically the rest of the nation would be entirely beholden to the whims of the most populous centers of the country: New York and California. The Electoral College system may not be perfect, yet it gives a voice to those outside of a few major metropolitan areas with incredibly dense populations, and for that I am grateful, as the United States is a Republic of States and not a single, homogeneous population.

The fact that he's repeatedly made claims against the validity and importance of these aspects of the Electoral College system in recent years gives me pause when evaluating his political views going forward. In the past I would've purchased his book immediately upon hearing it existed but now I'm definitely hesitant.

I am open to hearing alternative solutions for the Electoral College system that take into account the incredibly diverse Republic of States that our nation consists of, but his repeated claims of "a vote from a citizen of Montana is essentially worth [n]% that of a vote in California" seem disingenuous at best—even if literally true—as they ignore the reason for the Electoral College's existence to begin with, as well as how it fits into the rest of our system of government and elections.

My South Dakotan vote for President may be "worth more" than that of someone in California, yet California gets fifty-three Representatives whereas South Dakota gets only one.

>as they ignore the reason for the Electoral College's existence to begin with

Yes, almost 90% of people debating the Electoral College neglect to mention it was originally created as an alternative to citizens directly electing the president. It was never about giving citizens in Montana more power, it was about giving Montana more power. Thinking otherwise is hugely anachronistic. It wasn't even technologically possible at the time to take a nationwide popular vote.

In 1789, 1.8% of America voted. Four colonies didn't even hold a popular vote. [1] In 1800, 10 of 16 states had electors selected by state legislatures. In 1824, Andrew Jackson lost despite having a plurality of the popular vote and the vote as it would be assigned today (electors voting by the state majority). [2]

BTW, California gets 55 electoral college votes while South Dakota gets 3. South Dakota gets exactly as many senators as a state over 45 times as large.

Further, your argument that the rest of the nation would be helpless in a fair fight with New York and California just doesn't hold up. You have to include the 10 largest states to reach a majority of America. Ironically, while you claim opponents of the electoral college overlook the "incredibly diverse Republic of States", your argument only holds up if you ignore any diversity between those ten states, and the people inside them. Can you honestly say that California, Texas, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Georgia, and Florida are significantly more homogenous than the rest of America?

Furthermore, the electoral college does worse than nothing to protect local interests. America under the electoral college doesn't ensure every state gets counted. It ensures that swing states get counted. Are you really better off being counted as a member of a state that's gone red all but once since 1940, rather than as a person with an actual stake in the election?

Opponents of the electoral college don't primarily take issue with the weighting of votes. We take issue with the incredibly toxic effect winner take all states has on politics and policies.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_ele...

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Electoral_Colleg...

Lessig's bid as a 2016 presidential candidate on the premise that he would reform campaign finance and the immediately resign the presidency to VP was charming, inspiring, and somewhat amusing.

I wonder if you could swing a candidacy like that if you aimed lower than the Presidency?

I can think of several states that might jump at a gubernatorial candidate who said "I will take no political positions. I'll fix/repeal these faulty laws, reform those finance and districting issues, then resign." And a few towns have actually done it already when their budget issues got bad enough.

Obviously it's going to draw opposition from whoever thinks the finance or districting problems are benefitting them, but some places do hit the point where process issues look like a bigger deal than political ones.

Most think that corruption is the problem when in fact corruption is just a symptom.

In social change this is the only one that matters:

"(what is profitable)" all other "forces" are bound by this at systemic level.

> "(what is considered ethical)"

it can only function if you go back to "what is profitable" because if it is not ethical and there is no law to prevent it then it will be done because it is profitable.

If it is ethical, and it is not profitable, you can rest assure it will not be pursued not matter how good you feel.

Example: Feed the hungry, it is a great ethical idea, but it is seldom profitable so you do not see any company going out of their way to invest in feeding the hungry.

> "(what is legal)"

this also runs only on what is profitable. If it is not legal, but it is profitable then you can be sure that the laws will soon be changed to accommodate. i.e. Cannabis movement.

> "(what is technically possible)"

also runs on what is profitable. We can technically do anything we want but is it profitable?

Don't be fooled by these articles that find a "novel" way of looking at the problem. It is just noise. If you can't fix the monetary policy in the world, then "what is profitable" will always be what drives any social change

Would this be a good example of the kind of corruption he's talking about?

https://www.npr.org/2016/12/10/505079091/lawrence-lessig-off...

HN is slowly becoming a political message board in a world that already has all of the political message boards it needs or wants.

HN even has brigaders now. Its really pathetic. dang you have let this go to shit, I don't really care if you ban my account for saying so either.

I agree, and the political items that managed to not be flagged to hell are highly biased. If I wanted to see this kind of stuff I could easily find it elsewhere. I really wish there was a "nothing even remotely political" policy on HN. At least then it would be fair.

I would assume people of most political bents would be against corruption.

Lessig's views are political opinions and nothing more. His use of the term "corruption" is conjecture, plain and simple.

> His use of the term "corruption" is conjecture, plain and simple.

I suppose people in certain positions would have to be of this view, for their internal sanity.

That would be a logical assumption, wouldn't it.

Unfortunately laws and regulations affect tech, so it seems unavoidable to discuss them here.

Whether it’s net neutrality, IP law, GDPR, or what have you, there are worthwhile discussions to have about how laws affect tech and how they could be better.

I’d much rather have those discussions with people who understand technology well. People who don’t understand tech well have demonstrated that they will pass deeply flawed laws like the DMCA thanks in part to their lack of understanding (in addition to corruption of the political process).

Lessig isn't addressing any of those. He's simply lambasting a group of economists with whom he stridently disagrees.

You were complaining about HN "becoming a political message board," which I took to mean you didn't want to see any posts relating to politics here.

Also, as I recall Lessig's work used to focus on copyright and intellectual property, and it was his experience trying to advocate for sensible reforms to those laws that led him to shift his focus towards what he terms the "corruption" that allow the Disneys and Comcasts of the world to force through bad laws like the DMCA (or repealing net neutrality) and block more sensible laws and regulations. So there is a line from this post back towards tech-related law issues.

People have been saying that for a long time now:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1934367

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6157485

There has always been a mix of political stories here. pg's criterion was that they were ok as long as they were intellectually interesting and not only about politics.

Lots of links here if anyone wants more: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17014869

Reply on news.ycombinator.com