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Geronimo

Sunday, January 08, 2006

Lobbyists

What do they do? They attempt to get legislation that is instrumental in aiding a company, organization etc. or maybe that is to their detriment changed by influencing a legislator to steer the legislative body to a favorable completion. One such action comes to mind; getting the copyrights of music and songs extended from 20 years to the lifetime of the owner, or the extention of patent rights of medicine a second time to collect premium prices for their product..There a 35000 registered lobbyist in Washington. Is that enough to cost the consumers a hefty sum or not? They may get two or three this time which is almost nothing compared to the constant barrage that goes on every legislative day in Washington..How much do you suppose this activity is costing you and me Joe Consumer..The current flap going on over Abramoff is just one very small tip of the iceberg. I don't believe that one could come up with even one instance where the general public didn't get stung by this activity..

posted by Howard at 12:58 PM

4 Comments:

  • Oh, and now they are calling this outrageous activity an industry. Sheee>>>

    By Blogger Howard, at January 08, 2006 1:39 PM  

  • Abramoff is just the tip of a 2.5 trillion dollar iceberg, which just happens to be how much it costs us.

    By Blogger TKC, at January 12, 2006 7:12 PM  

  • I asked a Florida representative one time about the lobby and found that most of the people in the business of making law depend on them. Seems that the lobbyists on each- the pros and cons- do a good job of explaining their position and it saves the congressman and staff a lot of research. Once they examine each position they can then reach their decisions.

    I am not defending the lobbyists buying lawmakers. If the lobbyists were honest people representing a faction then I would have no objection. But, politics being politics we have just gotten to the point that we have the best politicians money can rent-can't buy the sumbitches any more because they will sell out to the highest offer.

    By Blogger GUYK, at January 18, 2006 10:56 AM  

  • GUYK, I would rather have the government pay for our representatives to have larger staffs so they could research these issues on their own.

    By Blogger EdMcGon, at January 25, 2006 3:33 AM  

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