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Comment by JumpCrisscross | Hacker News Reader

> laws where an organization cannot spend its resources on influencing the laws that manage its conduct

So the FTC is barred from commenting on a competition bill? Or the DoD on a military measure?

That would be ideal. Citizens should be deciding what they view as anti-comptetitive, or reasonable defensive actions, and the FTC and the DOD should act based on those decisions. In an ideal world.

i.e. democracy. That's what we have now. Citizens have decided that destroying the planet is good, actually.

Personally, I like the work that the FTC does but even in this situation, I would like to have them be split up into an enforcement part, and a sort of think tank / brainstorming / general investigation of trends part. You can argue that I have sort of moved the problem instead of eliminating it, but I would argue that it’s both a good start and a good on-ramp for winning the game of lobbyist influence whack-a-mole.

Yes. Can you explain why that would be bad? It is not at all obvious.

> Can you explain why that would be bad?

It bars experts from deliberation. It would require debating space policy while keeping anyone from NASA. For a good amount of policy space, that limits debate and discussion to the uninformed. While an oil lobbyist would love NOAA kept out of Congress during climate debates, I’m not sure who that helps apart from the blowhards.

As someone who worked for NASA, I can tell you that sounds like a great idea. NASA is stuck where it is exactly because of the vested interests from within the agency itself with undue influence. People that are too close to the problem can’t see the surrounding context and are blind to tradeoffs. The best space policy comes from independent space advocacy groups.

Edit: if you want a more authoritative version of the same take, read Escaping Gravity. I was at NASA at the same time she was deputy administrator, and I cannot emphasize enough how vilified she was. The epitome of the know-nothing outsider coming in the screw up the space program. There was a united front against her and her crazy ideas about commercial crew… and of course she’s been proven right on every point.

Reminds me of the internet outrage surrounding the "know-nothing" Bridenstine being appointed NASA Administrator, which ended up not only unfounded but aged incredibly poorly in retrospect.

One of the best NASA administrators ever. I really wish Biden would have been willing to keep him on.

*Lori Garver's "Escaping Gravity."

We're in a situation where agencies are advocating for the elimination of rights of the populace. How is that in their purview? Given the current law, an executive agency should be defending the rights of the people, not advocating to make more of them criminals where they aren't.

> It bars experts from deliberation.

They can vote and speak like any other person. This would also allow multiple views to come from an agency, not just from the political climbers at the top.

Hmm, there should probably be some sort of guardrails in place: like these agencies can comment on the bill, but not actually influence it. Or, maybe this only applies to enforcement agencies, versus regulatory ones like the FTC.

> these agencies can comment on the bill, but not actually influence it

How would you delineate these?

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