Details of MSFT's Antitrust Lobbying 711
An anonymous sent in linkage to "A new ZDNet article detailing new evidence presented to the judge presiding over the Microsoft anti-trust case. It shows that Microsoft made political contributions during last year's (well, 2000's) elections on a scale never seen before... over $6 million. As comparison, this is four times the amount spent by Enron.
It also reveals that Microsoft has been hiring every political lobbyist, and every law firm, with anti-trust expertise and putting them to work on unrelated projects- anything to make them unavailable to work for critics of Microsoft."
Re:Finally... (Score:0, Insightful)
Not to mention this is also sickening that this continues to go on. The average person has a shit-fit when they hear that someone in the government does something illegal like this, but here it is obvious that Microsoft has more power than that. They have budget books big enough to make six million dollars disappear, very few other companies do. It's time that the public learned of this.
I don't think we'll have another Enron, but something big, nonetheless (hopefully).
Re:fp (Score:4, Insightful)
Parties should be limited as to how much they can spend during a campaign (as they are in Europe) and should maybe even be paid for through taxation- it would cost less thant 1% of the military budget and is a far bettter way of safeguarding democracy.
Enron? (Score:3, Insightful)
So? What does Microsoft have to do with Enron? Oh, I get it..It's popular to bash Enron right now.
More to the point, what did you expect MS to do? Suddenly start playing fair?
Oh, you got me, here's where I hid the bodies, etc.? Please.
Bastards. (Score:1, Insightful)
Are we really any better off than the wild west?
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:5, Insightful)
If the Federal government were actually limited in scope (refer to Constitution here), then there would be a lot less to lobby for, to "contribute soft money" for, etc.
I would like to not only limit the power of the government, but prevent lawyers from holding office.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:3, Insightful)
This is dead on. I do not underastand those who say that the answer to bad ans stupid laws are is more of the same. People will bribe governments so long as governments have the power do something for them.
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)
Isn't this just like ... (Score:5, Insightful)
... charges that Microsoft buys (bought?) shelf space in stores to prevent competing products from even being visible?
So, in other words, this is really nothing new. This is Microsoft being Microsoft; now, does anyone seriously doubt that this is an organization bent on doing whatever it takes, including things that are not just immoral, or violate common sense, but possibly things that are criminal, in order to ... what, make money?
Has American society fallen so far into the pit of jade and cynicism that we shrug off the Enrons and Microsofts of the world as merely maladjusted money-seeking sycophants, instead of being so violently outraged that we take every chance to make them wish they'd never even started a business? What the hell are we doing?
Every person who reads about Microsoft's behavior should be so sickened that they vomit. This is not normal. This is not acceptable. This is not "business as usual" in the United States. Just because it seems to happen a lot does not make it something we should tolerate, not even for a millisecond, and not for any reason.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:3, Insightful)
The Justice system is so bogged down that Congress can pass laws that they know will not be repealed by the Justice Department for years (when they can claim it was their predecessors who passed it in the first place). The President has become more of a figurehead than the Queen of England.
What is even worse is that there is so much childish, partisanship in Congress that nothing ever gets done except when they have a common goal which is usually to benefit the corporate giants that line their pockets.
Wasted money... (Score:3, Insightful)
What a waste of resources.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not directed to the poster per se but to all who carp along these lines, in increasing numbers today:
Oh, whine whine whine. Of course people are going to find loopholes. Of course money will creep in again. Of course new dastardly means of influence peddling will be found.
How absolutely fratzen stupid is it to throw up your hands and say, "Oh, well, the system can't be made perfect so we shouldn't even try to improve it."
If new loopholes arise, plug them. Plain and simple. Yes, you'll actually have to keep figthing this battle. Yes, it will be honest-to-God actual work to be a member of a democracy. Horror of horrors.
Stop bemoaning the lack of perfectibility. It doesn't get us anywhere and it actually impedes what progress can be made.
The United States Government (Score:5, Insightful)
The real problem here is the idea of "corporate personhood" which extends all the civil rights meant for people (including buying congressmen, senators, presidents and supreme court justices) to corporations.
individual people, and and not-for-profit groups can not compete with the cash generated by a large corporation.
there is one easy solution to this (unfortunately, it's not easy:).
make all elections 100% publicly funded (I believe that england does this and each candidate can only spend something like 10,000 pounds), ban any political advertizing by any non candidate which mentions, depicts or hints where a particlar candidate or party stands on an issue.
Corporations (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that when a politician is elected due to large campaign contributions, he can't help but think that the contributions put him there rather than the votes of the citizens. He is elected, supposedly, to represent the needs of the citizens, but instead he ends up feeling like he is elected to represent the needs of his financiers (even an individual with good moral fiber will have this difficulty).
A politician "should" be concerned first and foremost about how each decision will impact a private citizen. For example, how will DMCA impact the average consumer (loss of their fair use rights), how will extension of copyright laws affect the average individual (they will have access to no new public domain material in their lifetime), etc.
It is getting to the point that the individuals need to hire lobbyists to plead their case with the politicians. Except that the politician was hired in the first place to be our lobbyist.
Re:Enron (Score:5, Insightful)
Currently, Enron is the posterchild for the reason for campaign finance reform. If our politicians are swayed by the campaign contributions of Enron's scale, what corruption is seeded by a larger sum of money? If the advertising power of the campaigns is knocked askew by some soft money, isn't it knocked asunder by larger sums?
For a few stories linking Enron to campaign finance, you can look at this topic list on Salon.com [salon.com]. The topic is campaign finance. The headlines mostly discuss Enron in recent weeks.
Re:We have no one to blame but our dollars (Score:3, Insightful)
Putting everything under the control of "one person, one vote" is simply mob rule. Democracy should have limits, as should every form of government.
Having an all-powerful central government, but making it "democratic," does not change the fact that it's still an all-powerful central government. It just means there's more people to bribe.
The real shocker.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Are they afraid or just not that observant? This is definatly newsworthy.
The ability to companies to donate money to politicians but shield which politician it is going to to is what is so evil about soft money. At least in the 20s the press could drag a politician through the mud based on his own specific donations. But what would the headline be now? at worst..."Republican party takes donations from Microsoft."
Campain money IS NOT SPEECH. It's just the opposite.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:3, Insightful)
When the government gets out of the tax-regulate-and-subsidize business, and sticks to preventing and punishing theft, injury, etc., then it will be performing its proper role. As long as a corporation can buy an advantage in the marketplace -- including shielding itself from liability -- then there will be a place for lobbying, bribes, etc.
Would you prefer a corporation, with no obligation to listen to you, make important choices for you
Absolutely not. I'm in favor of stripping corporations of their legal personhood, actually.
I believe that campaign finance reform is in itself at least a start to solving many of these sorts of problems.
Hmmm. Not really. It just stirs the pot a little. Strip corporations of their personhood, so they have no first amendment rights, and prohibit them from engaging in any political activity. I.e., make it the way things used to be.
Re:Yet another reason... (Score:3, Insightful)
One way to build the party is to run "issue ads". For the uninitiated, "Bill Clinton blows goats. Al Gore says Clinton is the best President ever." is an issue ad. On the other hand, "Bill Clinton blows goats. Al Gore says Clinton is the best President ever. Vote Gore." is supporting a political candidate, and thus is subject to hard money limits.
Now, on the one hand, the regulation of this spending means that there is no way that I could take out an ad saying "Vote for " on TV, because it's more costly than the rules allow. (This is blatantly unconstitutional.) On the other hand, I could take out an ad saying " is a total wad" and I'd be perfectly legal. Political parties can also take out such ads.
So you want to ban "soft money". Sorry, you can't. The Supreme Court has already held that "money is expression" in that preventing someone from airing their views violates the first amendment.
The Shays-Meehan (sp?) bill would instead ban unregulated contributions to political parties. There would be no prohibition on companies, unions or PACs running all the issue ads they want, or all the get out the vote campaigns they want, on behalf of a party, so long as the party does not direct their activities. Could somebody explain to me how preventing one body of private citizens (a political party) from doing something, while allowing another (say, a PAC) to do that thing, would be constitutional? It smacks of a bill of attainder, and certainly violates the first amendment in the event that what's being prevented is the expression of political views.
It seems to me that the better way to handle election finance issues is to require all money used for political purposes to be disclosed, and to prosecute those guilty of influence peddling or accepting bribes. In most cases, it won't be clear cut, but it would certainly be possible to recall politicians who are abusing their office by acting on behalf of those who spent money for them. And realistically, what would probably happen is that candidates would get more money directly, and outside spending would decrease.
-jeff
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:3, Insightful)
So when you reduce the power of the federal government... where does it go?
I seem to recall that the early power struggles in our countries infancy were primarily federal government vs. state governments. If more power were granted to the states, Microsoft and other corporations would merely switch their focus to brib^H^H^H^H contributing to state and local officials (Not that they're overlooking them now, mind).
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:4, Insightful)
That would create a class based government system (as if it isn't already). Because then only rich people could afford to serve the government, because the working class would have to work to eat.
Re:this is very common (Score:3, Insightful)
Jaded...nothing new really (Score:5, Insightful)
As a Canadian, reading the reactions of various slashdotters, I find it very interesting.
We as a tech community are so ready to shout that Microsoft is evil. You guys are forgetting that this is the American way (which applies to us up too...). Remember those Railroad Tycoons, the Oil Tycoons? The Rockafellers of the world are still around. Why do you think Texas has so many industries that could have been put elsewhere? (Count how many military bases that there are in Texas?)Prominent Texans ensured that Texas was given the goods, and in our present system of government they did not only what they could, but what was expected and did what benefited Texans and especially those prominant citizens. (Sorry Texans, but its the only example I know of as an ignorant canuck ;)
Using money to influence government policy is how government has functioned for a long time. Remember in Ancient Rome, being in position of political power made you rich as businesses petitioned for your support. This is not going to change anytime soon unless we as a society decide that is unacceptable.
America is the land of the free. Its the land of who has got more $$$. The more dough you have, the more freedom you have to do as you wish for good or ill.
Don't piss on M$ because they are doing what is in their best interests and that they have the freedom to do so. Its disgusting that they did do it, but I am much more revolted that the so called democracy of the world is nothing more than auction and that THIS seems news to people . We have to as a society against this truly undemocratic behaviour.
Hopefully this will serve as a case in point for seriously look at our Politicians and their Political Parties and how they govern us.
Though I suppose it could be worse... at least we pretend to have democracy.
Don't mind me though I am just a jaded youth....
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:2, Insightful)
And when the government does not have any power anymore, we will have to bribe whatever entity governing instead of the government. I prefer to pay tax than "microsoft tax" or mob "protection" tax.
Re:Finally... (Score:2, Insightful)
Was Sun contributing money while they were involved in legal action regarding their business practices?
The Microsoft situation is less a matter of corporate political contributions than it is a matter of historic antitrust precedent. That M$'s behavior was not technically illegal brings to mind the Nuremburg legal defense that a war of genocidal agression was not illegal.
Indeed, at the moment, it is not illegal to employ monopolistic activities on a scale without comparison in human history to turn the entire information industry into an oligarchy. As for myself, I find very little comfort in witholding my outrage based on this technicality.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:3, Insightful)
True but would you rather the bribes that polititican take be legal, as they are now, in the form of "Soft Money"? Or would you rather the that the dishonest people in government really act like crooks and be forced to solicit and accept illegal bribes? I would much rather see that we call it what it is (a bribe) and treat it that way, then wave our arms and declare that the real problem is elsewhere.
Yes I understand that this is not to the point of the original argument, that government is to big and must be reduced, but change will most likely be incremental and not all at once. Let's take our victories where we can.
Re:Finally... (Score:3, Insightful)
As a publicly traded company, they have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders.
If they spend money away like this and don't expect a return, they are not living up to that responsibility.
On the other hand, if they're spending the money and they DO expect something back, then these are bribes.
Either way, I don't see how a publicly held corporation can spend any of its money on political activities.
Re:A contrarian viewpoint. (Score:3, Insightful)
It's especially disgusting when you realize the actual costs to us collectively. For a few millions, corporations buy their way into legal tax and accounting loopholes and exceptions worth TENS OF BILLIONS of dollars. It's estimated that there are at least $50bn in taxes uncollected due to shuttling profits to offshore holding companies. I think the "economic stimulus package" Bush proposed gave almost that much away to a few big companies like IBM. It is also quite common for companies like Pepsi(!) to use "restructuring" to avoid paying any income tax.
It would be cheaper to pay all of our Sentators and Congresspeople a million dollars a year and give a million dollar government sponsored budget to every candidate with more than 25% poll numbers in every race for each seat than to keep the current system of influence peddling.
Hell, if you paid people that much, you could even forbid them from working after they retire and avoid the corporate board/Presidential cabinet recycling loop that is an even bigger bribery scam than campaign contributions.
Re:And, we have no one to blame but ourselves. (Score:4, Insightful)
Regulation is, like it or not, extending punishing of theft and injury laws to companies. Regulating companies stops them from harming their workers, their neigbours, their customers because they can. It also stops them from doing violence to other companies - which, let's be honest, is exactly what MS is currently on trial for, using its strength to force other companies out of the market or their products onto customers at nasty terms.
You actually contradict yourself. To quote, "As long as a company can buy an advantage in the marketplace
Subsidies are a harder argument, but here goes...
Remove subsidies of all kinds (I'm including Social Security benefits here, they seem analagous) and you cause problems. You know all about needing money to make money? Well, how do you get that first step without money from _somewhere_? Anyway, you create people who simply can't earn a living (and where this isn't necessarily a permanent condition), so they either die or live from crime. Think what happens in a recession here - the very poorest either die or cause a crimewave. A crimewave causes clear problems for society as a whole, and ends up with a number of them locked up. So, what do you end up with? A larger prison population (expensive to maintain) and a smaller labour force, which pushes up wages and makes it harder to get ourt of recession. Eventually, you end up with smaller economic capacity this way because you simply don't have the workers you need. Whereas if you give them the money / resources they need to see out the recession, they remain economically active throughout the problems (so help maintain economic capacity) and are available to work afterwards, so keeping costs down due to a large labour force. Oh, you've also likely lost the majority of the crime which is good on its own but also reduces your expensive-to-maintain prison population.
Or maybe health benefits. If the poorest can't get treatment then you have an increased potential for epidemic which can spread into the wider population. They're not likely to be particularly healthy to start with (worse diet & living conditions, can't afford better) so they're more susceptible, plus the poorer sections of society tend to live together, helping it spread quickly among them. Deny them medical treatment and ailments can run through them at ridiculous rates, then spread into the wider population. Also, deny them medical treatment and some will die, some will be disabled in some way and some will have to miss work. In each case you've removed someone from the available cheap labour pool, maybe others who now have to care for them too...
What about subsidising companies? Well, statistically speaking, I understand that the major driver for economic growth is small companies, not large. Except that they can't exist without seed capital from somewhere... Remove government subsidies and some won't survive, so lower economic growth as a whole.
Or another example, farm subsidies. The EU Common Agricultural Policy is a mess, I won't deny it. However... In the UK, we have many areas where sheep are farmed on open hillsides traditionally. These are only viable due to subsidies, because the animal densities are too low. Remove the subsidies and the sheep go. Remove the sheep, though, and the land quickly becomes covered in long grass and bracken. At which point it's considered less beautiful and is certainly less suitable for walking. You then have no farming income - and an area that only has tourism left, but can't any more attract people to look at the views and walk the hills because the environment has changed. You need the sheep as lawnmowers...
The current system is a long way from being perfect. Heck, I'm a LibDem (http://www.libdems.org.uk/) so I'm working to change it in many ways. But, strangely enough, many of the current aspects of government have been set up because they look like a good idea and retained because they prove that they are a good idea! I'd LOVE to see corporations stripped of legal personhood, too, for example, and see no reason for them to make any political donations. Heck, while we're thinking about corporate political influence, it seems daft that sitting legislators can hold directorships in companies, or that individual companies can own large chunks of the news media. Or that foreign-owned companies can own any. Who says that an Australian run media isn't spinning the news to favour Australian interests over local? As you can see here, we have clear examples of corporate political speech needing legal controls to benefit the people...
Posters in general and moderators in particular, _please_ think a little harder about this 'smaller government rules' (whoops, pun unintentional...) argument. It may sound good - and some of it may indeed be good - but look at the details and much of it is utter rubbish. Really.
Re:Isn't this just like ... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The United States Government (Score:4, Insightful)
Whoo-hoo! Vindication! Proof! If you read the article, it ends making my point:
"The analysis of donations by political party shows some surprising results. While Microsoft donations favored Republicans (who got 72 percent of the money from 1995 to 1998), its employees were more inclined to support the Democrats. Democratic PACs received $222,100 from the company's employees, compared to the $42,875 for Republican PACs. "
So the CORPORATION of M$ which is actually Gates, gives its money and holds positions counter to the vast majority of its own employees. A corporation cannot have rights, only INDIVIDUALS have rights. This corporation, like virtually all such monsters, does NOT hold legitimate points of view, it only presents the point of view of the CEO/President, or (some) board members while the majority of what makes up the corporation is ignored.
Mantra: Only individuals have rights, not corporations. Corporations are NOT people.