Facebook to launch its own political action committee | Hacker News Reader

Facebook to launch its own political action committee

latimesblogs.latimes.com

35 pointsjoeybaker15 comments

I'm Canadian so I don't really understand how these "PAC" things works. The article says that by law Facebook the corporation is not allowed to give donations to politicians but they're allowed to collect money from their employees and forward it along with a wink, wink, nudge, nudge Facebook would like this?

As an employee, why would you go for this? If you prefer a republican candidate and gave money to Facebook to give out on your behalf can they just go ahead and give it to the opposition of your preferred candidate?

I imagine this was initially done by labor unions in the past and now corporations have co-opted this loophole but still, this all seems very strange to me.

Also, does Facebook have a responsibility to track who's giving what? Because if they have international hires on staff, surely only citizens of the US can donate?

PACs distribute money based on business interests. So the idea is that if your interests align with theirs, then it's easier for them to distribute the money to the wide array of candidates instead of you researching every single one.

"Also, does Facebook have a responsibility to track who's giving what? Because if they have international hires on staff, surely only citizens of the US can donate?"

Yes. I also believe your name is publicly listed as a donor if your contribution is over a certain amount. For example, here are the donors to AT&T's pac: http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgave2.php?cycle=2012&...

On a slightly related note, companies with foreign HQs but with an American divisions can create PACs and get contributions from American employees.

Sometimes I think every child that's born should receive not only a Social Security Number, but a trust, a holding corporation, and a political action committee in his/her name.

The political and legal playing field has always been tilted in one way or another, but it keeps getting more and more extreme.

> Sometimes I think every child that's born should receive not only a Social Security Number, but a trust, a holding corporation, and a political action committee in his/her name.

This actually seems like a totally reasonable and intelligent suggestion. Or maybe people get it when they turn 18, or at least a course in high school about how to form entities and what the tradeoffs are in doing so.

Would be a hell of a lot more useful than a lot of the half-baked high school courses that kids are forced to go through now. Hmm... I'm thinking on this, I actually really like the idea.

>a trust

Man, I'd love a gun trust.

For people who don't know, this is basically a single-purpose entity for the purpose of owning certain types of firearms (usually National Firearms Act regulated items, e.g. machine guns or sound suppressors) in a way which is exempt from certain aspects of purchasing them outright (e.g. needing the approval of local law enforcement if you're a natural person making the purchase, but not a corporate entity). Trusts are also better for survivorship/transfer, and provide some limited liability or asset protection. Individual registered machine guns appreciated overnight in 1986 from $5 (a small piece of metal) to >$10k, due to regulations which forbid making new ones transferable for civilian ownership.

It's pretty similar to setting up a corporation to own/manage a single rental property, for instance to protect from liability if you own a parking lot and someone damages a car, or meth addicts burn down a condo building.

This man speaks the truth.

Not too sure why I got downvoted for wanting a corporate entity to handle all my firearms transfers though.

I just fail to see how the employees of Facebook, or any company really, can't make their voices heard by doing a minimum level of research and supporting a candidate or NGO on their own.

If you want any government to listen to you, you must build an "army" (your own group of power and influence). This is how it was always done, and how it will always be. This is why oil companies stick together, car companies did too. This is why priests who molested children where hidden for decades. This is why we have 300+ million Americans and only 2 political parties.

You can get away with anything as long as you are very aggressive and build your own army of supporters. The average person's lack of balls, and inability to organize and stick together is the ultimate reason why "normal people" are so often ignored when it comes to legislature. Yes you can protest, but walking around in the street asking for things doesn't do anything. When you have an army you do not "ask" for anything, you walk in and you "demand" it.

I'm not surprised by this. In fact, I'm surprised this hasn't happened much sooner and their lobbying budget is sub-$5 million dollars. They're going to have to gain legislative access to sustain their business model of "disclosing information to third parties for the economic benefit of Facebook."

One more confirmation that we are indeed living in cyberpunk times!

I really don't know if I want Facebook involved in politics when they show such a blatant cavalier approach to privacy, regardless of how its (what can soon be referred to as) constituents think of it.

with great power comes great responsibility.There is little doubt that facebook has the power now.Lets see if they can act responsibly!

Uh... are you unaware of their track record? I don't see why they would suddenly start acting responsibly now.

True that!but lets hope!

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