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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices
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To: i-node who wrote (958183)8/21/2016 11:46:14 PM
From: puborectalis  Read Replies (1) of 1577191
 
in an open society like the U.S., our brightest minds are unable to draw meaningful distinctions between handing someone an envelope full of cash and flooding a senator’s campaign war chest, except to point out that lobbying is far more effective. A briber wants a to circumvent the law. A lobbyist wants to change it.

The fact that laws affect everyone supposedly makes lobbying more legitimate, since the lobbyist isn’t typically asking for special treatment the way a briber does. But maybe that’s the problem. Someone who pays a bribe might be rich, powerful and dangerous, but they’re also uniquely vulnerable. They open themselves to extortion by the corrupt official they’re using, for example. Harstad and Svensson write: “Promises by individual bureaucrats not to ask (or extort) bribes in the future are not credible, since such contracts cannot be written when corruption is illegal and because firms deal with different officials over time.”

The lobbyist takes no such risk. The lobbyist’s goal is to make the government official depend on them for financing and support in elections. A bribe works once. Cajoling or inducing a congressional representative to help get a law changed is the gift that keeps on giving.
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