Amazon's Jeff Bezos 'may have lied to Congress' | Hacker News Reader

Amazon's Jeff Bezos 'may have lied to Congress'

bbc.com

40 pointsboto317 comments

https://www.rollcall.com/2018/11/30/cohen-among-select-few-c...

> Pursuing criminal charges against those who are untruthful to Congress would be a huge shift from tradition. “Almost no one is prosecuted for lying to Congress,” attorney PJ Meitl wrote in a 2006 law review article on the topic, “in fact, only six people have been convicted of perjury or related charges in relation to Congress in the last sixty years.”

Emphasis mine.

Now that he isn’t CEO, he can go to prison without harming the employees and investors.

No one gets prosecuted for lying to Congress.

It is rare, but it does happen:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/5-people-who-lied-...

Good list, Caspar Weinberger stands out as a Washington insider, the exact type that are in the wink wink nudge nudge club. Holdeman, was too toxic to protect.

Just like Ken Griffin

Not suggesting that this practice is ok or reasonable, but many other big tech companies have used similar advantages to steal from smaller innovators.

Apple, Microsoft, and Google have all copied novel technologies from their smaller business partners, effectively shutting out the creators.

Walmart and other big chains have used their sales information to know which products were worth making “house brand” copies of, then promoting those alongside the original ones.

Heck, even lying to Congress has been common and largely unpunished for years now.

American capitalism is a formidable power.

>Walmart and other big chains have used their sales information to know which products were worth making “house brand” copies of, then promoting those alongside the original ones.

Aren't those white label products? Major manufacturers produce them, meaning they're similar in quality to regular brands, but at a lower price point. Which would mean the producer would get to target customers at two price points, which is nice.

Sometimes it is white label, and sometimes, where the profit margin is there, they will have them made by a competitor or even fully in-house.

It doesn’t take long for consumers to know which white label brands belong to the retailer.

But it doesn’t even matter what the brand is. If it looks like an equal replacement for a more expensive product, many consumers will gravitate to the cheaper option.

Ahh, blaming the algorithms. Those nasty algorithms, where DO they come from, the pesky little things!?

Any heading that has the word 'may' indicates that the article is questionable.

The word "may" here indicates that the facts of the case will need to be decided by US Congress, not the BBC. The fact that Congress is considering "criminal investigation" of Bezos over his testimony is both credible and newsworthy, regardless of what the facts of the case are decided to be.

Yes, but too many media outlets have abused the "may" thing so badly that maybe it's just better to say, "Congress considers launching criminal investigation into Bezos testimony"

Generally I'd agree. But it is the BBC, and it directly quotes the letter from the US House Judiciary Committee to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, which is the source for this article.

I'm not talking about the article. I'm talking about the headline. Yes, the headline is a direct quote. It's still a bad headline.

> Yes, but too many media outlets have abused the "may" thing so badly that maybe it's just better to say, "Congress considers launching criminal investigation into Bezos testimony"

I don't agree at all, and your assertion contrasts with what is clearly stated in the article.

The BBC article quotes the letter signed by five members of the US House Judiciary Committee which states:

> "At best, this reporting confirms that Amazon's representatives misled the Committee. At worst, it demonstrates that they may have lied to Congress in possible violation of federal criminal law," the letter states.

BBC provides a direct quote. It was the committee members which stated that Bezos "may have lied", not BBC. It's as unambiguous as it gets.

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