Two Congressional Staffers Who Helped Write SOPA Become Entertainment Lobbyists

> Anyway, these measures are treating a symptom. The real problem is that the federal government is vastly too large in size and scope. Reduce the power and programs run by the federal government, and radically simplify the tax code, and you'll dry up the opportunities for corruption.

And that would only treat the problem of government corruption while exacerbating issues of social inequality. I'm all for fiscal responsibility but the empirical evidence seems to suggest that cutting social services and public good projects leads to net harm for society as a whole (see: Texas.)

As a whole, I find the prevalence of libertarianism among tech types curious. As a whole they (we) are often rationalist and evidence-based in orientation but the libertarian position derives more from principle than empirical evidence -- the same charges many libertarians would level against religion-based politics.

> Additionally, the U.S. Constitution does not really permit blanket restrictions on employment for individuals.

As far as I know, blanket employment restrictions for individuals in the form of "will not do X for N years post-employment" have never been struck down under a U.S. constitutional rationale. Some states (such as California) ban or heavily restrict them, but federal law doesn't appear to.

Yes, because once all that power exists at the state level instead, the companies will all surrender and stop trying to incentivize officials into giving them a competitive advantage.

No, more likely they'll just move to the state level. And it'll probably cost them less at that, since state officials are significantly less visible and will have less power.

I think one of the root problems is how Senate and House committees work, i.e. almost completely unaccountably. I'm sure they have a few debates, but nothing is public. They then present their findings to Congress, which is too busy to properly examine every committee recommendation.

Is the incentive any different at the state level? Or are we talking about vast deregulations?

It would be unenforcable in the same way its impossible to stop every crime, but the fact that it is illegal + the fact that they are getting so well paid anyways, it would greatly disincentivise such activities

Or, as Douglas Adams puts it: "He who most wants to lead is the person who should in no way be allowed to do so."

and also

"To summarize the summary, people are a problem."

Not any more it isn't. Freaking supreme court. 8(

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Elec...

SuperPACs...

A few things to keep in mind. First off, the President appoints judges and justices, but in no way does he guide them once they've been appointed. When appointing these positions, the best the President can do (keep in mind they have to be confirmed by 2/3s of the Senate) is to try to pick someone who will not undo years of jurisprudence the President agrees with. Once the position has been appointed, the President no longer has any control, and I believe the evidence says Presidential initiatives have both been supported and torn down at various times by the same judges and justices they've appointed.

Additionally, the President is the leader of his party,but there is a significantly greater power to being the leader of the Republican party than that of the Democratic party. This is because the Democratic party is much more fragmented and pulls from a much wider pool of underlying ideas than does the Republican one, so legislators representing their communities will be much tougher to keep on a coherent party message on a given issue. This is why, despite the strong hand he was dealt, the healthcare package passed by the Congress was lackluster at best: the Republican support was uniformly against it, while the Democratic support was extremely fragmented.

The President gets a free pass insofar as one has to look and see whether he's used the tools at his disposal to try to guide things in the right direction. You don't judge him by the result, but by whether he did what he could to influence it “correctly”, no matter what the result ultimately was. In the specific case of lobbying/corruption, mind you, I think (a) the evidence is unclear-to-negative and (b) Obama quickly decided to lose the focus on that in favor of trying to pull out of the recession as best he could and passing some of his legislative priorities. Whether the latter was a good decision or not is definitely up for debate. In a similar vein, the civil rights verbiage from the campaign for the most part went into a tailspin within a year of his taking office.

First, the president's only legislative power is the power of the veto. He can't sign a bill that isn't presented to him, so if congress never presents a lobbying reform bill, he never gets to sign it.

Secondly, the purpose of the judicial system is not to "legislate from the bench." It is to strike down unconstitutional legislation. Despite what some recent conservative appointees have decided their role is. Off topic, but I do find it somewhat telling that the few federal judges who think it is their moral right to legislate from the bench usually are deeply involved in right wing religion and other forms of crazy.

I agree with what you said. We should not be mad that he hasn't done it, we should be mad when a presidential candidate makes the ridiculous claim that he could do anything in the first place.

I love candidates like Ron Paul, but even he is dishonest when he says he could "drain the swamp" and cut $1 trillion from the budget. No President has that kind of power.

Let's not forget to also be pissed at the "fourth estate" which offered not a single whit of criticism of Obama's ridiculous statements throughout the primary and presidential campaigns, and instead acted solely as his cheerleaders.