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Comment by oatmeal_coffee | Hacker News Reader

You can't paint all lobbying with the same brush. There are beneficial lobbying groups out there helping to bring a voice to issues in an arena where they would otherwise normally be drowned out. We just focus on the bad ones because they tend to have greater influence. Absolutist positions such as this are rarely true and sensible.

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If the question was whether or not to ban lobbying, how do the benefits of lobbying stack up against the damage? That whole cost-benefit analysis thing...

Have a guess. I have one: the consumer pays up nicely in the end. Lobbying is done (most of the time) for the benefit of coorporations who wan't to expand their business volume.

The question is whether or not to ban lobbying is not a reasonable one, if only because lobbying would not be able to be banned just on a principle of free speech alone. People have a voice—good, bad, whatever—and lobbying provides an efficient means of communicating that voice. The question is rather how to reduce, if not obviate, the damage caused by the role of money in lobbying without violating free speech rights.

Yeah... I think the whole premise behind SuperPACs is the ridiculous notion that money = speech and campaign contributions are protected free speech.

Money is not speech, despite the Citizens United ruling.

So Congress could set limits on how much money the New York Times could spend to cover federal elections?

News coverage of federal elections is vastly different than candidate advocacy.

Agreed. But news agencies seem to cross that divide when they feel the need to endorse political candidates.

It doesn't matter how different it is: If money is not speech, why couldn't Congress prevent the Times from spending money to write and print articles about candidates?

LOL what? The New York Times has endorsed a Democratic president for the last 50 years or something.

Is it? I think instead of funding a superPAC I'll start a news organization to cover the election as I see fit.

Lobbying also includes when you call your representative to complain about a certain issue.

So, to ban lobbying outright is to ban input from every citizen to their representative.

Solution: Only a candidate can pay for ads, campaigning, and the like. There is a campaign contribution cap reasonably low as your average citizen could reach it. None of these BS PACs, none of this "I'll make a large donation if you 'listen' to what I want".

What happens in the rich candidate vs poorer candidate elections then? The richer one would get a lot more viewership and exposure, increasing his chances to win.

It doesn't solve the problem.

Hell, allocate a specific amount to each candidate for elections. We already have such a system in place[0]. Just make that mandatory.

[0] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_election_campaign_...

Easy, limit them to the same campaign contribution as everybody else.

The problem, of course, is that the courts have struck down similar (actually, less restrictive) laws. So it doesn't seem as though there is any path that would lead us to that from where we currently stand.

Nobody but a lobbyist would use "lobbying" to describe direct contact by unpaid citizens.

Is there a name for the argumentative tactic of lumping unlike things together so one can say "if you hate me you must also hate yourself"?

I am not a lobbyist, but I am aware of the fact that contacting your representative to do something you want him/her to do is, in fact lobbying them. It's literally the dictionary definition:

"seek to influence (a politician or public official) on an issue."

My personal opinion is that an individual calling their representative is not the same as tons of money being poured into campaigns, but the fact remains that it is, by definition, lobbying.

Therefore, doing away with ....all.... lobbying, as the original post suggested we do, removes our voices from the system as well.

Is there a name for the argumentative tactic of speaking for a fictitious group of people so one can say, "I believe the thing you're saying is wrong, therefore everyone believes the thing you're saying is wrong"?

What is your point, then, exactly? First of all, it's clear the original post wasn't talking about "lobbying" as you've quoted its definition but not its actual usage. So why bring it up at all, if not to discourage those who support campaign reform simply by browbeating them into submission?

Seriously, why discuss trivial definitional disagreement when it only serves to muddy the waters and decrease the SNR of the conversation?

Because when it comes to campaign reform, there is only one way to accomplish it; legislation. Word choice and accurate usage are the most important things when it comes to legislation. You've never experienced tedious noise until you've been involved in the process of drafting federal legislation.

It's not implied purpose that matters. If you leave ambiguity, someone will read ambiguity. That's why there are entire panels and institutions dedicated to interpreting the meaning of the law.

So, I brought it up, because if you say 'we should do away with all lobbying', that does, by definition, include contacts by citizens to representatives. The original question was whether the benefits from good lobbying outweighed the drain of bad lobbying. I put my two cents in because I felt it necessary to define lobbying to render the question null through poor word choice.

The real question is whether or not substantive campaign finance reform needs to occur. Businesses and citizens both should have access to their representatives. It's whether or not a business or wealthy enough citizen should be able to effectively buy an elected official.

But that wasn't the question.

  There are beneficial lobbying groups out there helping to 
  bring a voice to issues in an arena where they would 
  otherwise normally be drowned out.

Lobbying is like advertising[1] in that it's a vicious cycle. If company A spends $100 on advertising, then they capture the market, and push out company B. In retaliation, company B spends $150, and company A spends $200...

In 2010, Coca-cola spent $2.9 billion on advertising. They only did that because Pepsi spent about the same amount.

"Good" lobbyists only exist because bad lobbyists exist. If you could cut the budget of every lobbying firm by 50% then nothing would change. The only thing that affects outcomes i proportional spend.

1: In fact it is advertising, to an audience segment of one.

Companies like coca cola and mcdonalds have to advertise that much because they offer poor quality products that would otherwise be irrelevant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8344345

You know what's also a good way to bring issues into 'the arena'? People's initiatives. Democracy is only really a stable system that can protect civil rights if you go all the way with it. There shouldn't be a law that the people as a whole cannot throw out. Otherwise a political system is not worth being called 'democracy' (= reign of the people). The government is supposed to be serving the people as a whole, not just a few financially strong and powerful groups.

Democracy != Republic

Look at how screwed up California is due to the ability of propositions to be enacted without any concern for how they'll be financed.

With all the communications and monitoring technology, I am surprised we still have the antiquated representative system. This system came about in an era where the travel time of a message was in days not milliseconds.

Lobbying in the form of "We think this is a good idea, and here's why you should vote for it" is fine, regardless of the issue. Lobbying in the form of "We think this is a good idea, and a million dollars says you should vote for it" is bad, regardless of the issue, even if the position they advocate is a good one.

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