[governance] Facebook spent $4 million to lobby U.S. lawmakers in 2012

[Roland Perry]

In message <066a01cdfa5a$01b28610$05179230$@gmail.com>, at 09:41:02 on 
Thu, 24 Jan 2013, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> writes
>I think the issue is whether or not the outcome is in the (general) public
>interest or rather serves narrow sectional (corporate) private interests.
>
>http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/22/local/la-me-att-20120422
>
>The US system appears skewed towards the latter and this is shocking and
>disturbing to those (including many in the US) who find this to be a form of
>corruption and as undermining democracy.

What I was trying to point out is that the general public can influence 
lawmakers completely free of charge. They may not be very persuasive one 
at a time (either because they aren't a very good advocate or they don't 
have a very good cause) but lots of them added up can have an effect.

As for the issue of private funding for political parties (and 
individual candidates) there are some democracies that place limits on 
the amount that can be raised (and spent) and I believe there are some 
where that limit is zero and campaign funds are allocated from a 
national fund for the purpose.

But that's a bigger discussion of how different countries implement 
different forms of democracy, and somewhat outside the scope of this 
list.
-- 
Roland Perry

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