Clinton and the Lobbyists

Hillary Clinton got some boos for her defense of lobbyists and, indeed, her initial response -- which amounted to pointing out that some Democratic-leaning interest groups have lobbyists, too -- wasn't very compelling. The second time around, though, she got the right answer, namely that lobbyists do their jobs because they get hired by people and Obama and Edwards take money from the executives and so forth who do the hiring, so the whole distinction is basically meaningless.

As best I can tell, that's totally correct; refusing to take money from lobbyists is just a kind of meaningless grandstanding.

Comments

Grandstanding maybe, but not meaningless. Or to put it another way, just because the outcome is the same doesn't mean that it doesn't matter how you get there.

Posted by MikeJ | August 4, 2007 4:21 PM

Transparency...

I guess you can argue that at least when people take money straight from the executives, the public knows just who you got that money from. With lobbyists and various PACs it can be hidden just where that money is coming from.

Posted by zAmboni | August 4, 2007 4:23 PM

I think Matt's basically right. But what I don't get is, if it's completely meaningless grandstanding with no real downside, then why does Hillary not also refuse to take lobbyist contributions?

Posted by Tom | August 4, 2007 4:30 PM

Gotta give her credit on that one. In a situation where it would have been a lot easier to tell the crowd what they wanted to hear.

Posted by DRR | August 4, 2007 4:36 PM

So I'm at a loss here. Are we saying that lobbyists are not bad anymore? Because, okay, I'll admit I don't really get how campaign finance works-there's all this stuff I'd have to read to catch up on it, that I just haven't been able to squeeze in-between reruns of Thundercats. Don't they have disproportionate influence over congresspeople, or something like that? And not just them, but also those unelected congressional staffers that do most of the bitch work that is sometimes referred to as "legislation"? Now I'm just confused.

Posted by Gordon Lightfoot | August 4, 2007 5:12 PM

Matt, you can't be serious. Are you telling me receiving millions in lobbyist money doesn't influence a politician ideals? Lobbyist money is the modern day equivalent of public bribery. It is very corrupting.

Posted by Winston | August 4, 2007 5:21 PM

Are we saying that lobbyists are not bad anymore?

No, but Obama or Edwards will take money from a co-ordinated effort by corporation X to solicit personal contributions from the executives of corporation X. Then it becomes a meaningless end-run around lobbyists.

Posted by Ed Marshall | August 4, 2007 5:24 PM

I'd be inclined to think that lobbyist contributions are particularly objectionable because lobbyist's are people who are paid specifically to turn money into access and influence. There's got to be some difference between Johnny Richboy giving a politician $2300 out of the kindness of his heart, or even in the hope of some benefit or other, and Johnny Richboy hiring a guy to give that same politician $2300 with the understanding that the guy will do his best to make that contribution as 'effective' as possible.

Not a huge difference, to be sure, but a difference nonetheless.

Posted by SeanD | August 4, 2007 5:27 PM

Matthew, due to his youth, is missing the point.

Lobbyists _institutionalize_ corruption. They know where the weak points and externalities are in our system of government, and take advantage of them. Mere donations, in contrast, get occasional access. I've lobbied, and that's been my experience (of other lobbyists, of course....).

Posted by vorkosigan1 | August 4, 2007 6:15 PM

Yeah, I'll agree that what Obama and Edwards are doing is pointless, but let's not get into Fred Thompson territory in which anything is okay as long as someone's paying you, in which professionalism is the only virtue.

Posted by Consumatopia | August 4, 2007 6:17 PM

"Are you telling me receiving millions in lobbyist money doesn't influence a politician ideals?"

Holman Jenkins at the WSJ made the point that lobbyists typically support politicians who agree with their positions already, and help these candidates get elected or reelected; few lobbyists convince politicians to change their strongly-held policy positions. Consider this thought experiment: can you imagine a lobbyist for a for-profit education company such as Edison Schools convincing Nancy Pelosi to support a voucher system? Probably not, right?

The real potential for corruption, IMO, is the occasional politician who has no ideals or strongly held political positions and is just looking to get paid, e.g., Duke Cunningham or William Jefferson.

Posted by Fred | August 4, 2007 7:13 PM

few lobbyists convince politicians to change their strongly-held policy positions

True, but few politicians have strongly-held policy positions (or constituent interests) in every area. I might not be able to get Nancy P to support a voucher system, but if I wanted her to support lowering tarriffs on imports from the Dominican Republic I might have a shot. Not a quid-pro-quo, of course; never something that blatant. But if I donated a couple grand to her campaign and a few more to her PAC, I could probably get ten minutes of her time to explain how important this issue is, while those on the opposite side of the issue might not be able to get the time to make their case....

Posted by Dave Pooser | August 4, 2007 8:14 PM

Right. Even if lobbyists only enjoy influence at the margins, that's still more influence than anyone else gets in the voting booth, which makes it well worth the expense.

Posted by Gordon Lightfoot | August 4, 2007 8:27 PM

Is there anything fundamentally wrong with Nancy Pelosi spending ten minutes listening to the reasons for lowering tarrifs on Dominican goods?

I'm as cynical as the next guy, but the knee jerk labeling of lobbiests and "those evil corporations" as the Great Satan just seems a touch naive.

The founding fathers structured the government specifically to be responsive to narrow special interests - from a district, or a state, or a region.

The real problem with our system today is not that lobbiests get ten minutes of time to discuss policy issues, but rather than candidates must spend virtually all their time raising money in the first place.

Posted by hwc | August 4, 2007 8:29 PM

The problem is that the current system ensures that a specific class of special interests enjoys disproportionate influence in the halls of Congress. Poor single mothers in the ghetto are an interest group, but they aren't going to be cobbling together lobby money to get their message out any time soon. The current system benefits organizations with money over organizations without it. Legislation is frequently influenced because of lobbying-this isn't an empirically uncontroversial claim. Using money to gain access to the ears of politicians in order to manipulate legislation by any other name is corruption. This has led some people to accuse lobbying as being an institutionalization of corruption. Some of us find this particularly galling because it undermines the egalitarian assumptions upon which democratic government is supposedly based. What I am saying is that, yes, there can be something fundamentally wrong about Nancy Pelosi taking ten minutes to hear about the horrors of Dominican Republic trade tariffs, particularly if that time was "purchased" with a generous campaign contribution from the relevant interests.

Posted by Gordon Lightfoot | August 4, 2007 8:48 PM

Yes, let's never forget that lobbyists, and the people whose money they give to politicians, contribute out of the goodness of their little bitty altruistic hearts, and actually trying to influence votes on legislation they care about is the farthest thing from their minds.

Posted by kafka | August 4, 2007 9:29 PM

Not all lobbyists are bad people, or represent bad groups.

Do you think lobbyists for, say, environmental groups are bad?

Do you think lobbyists for the homeless are bad people, or represent a bad cause?

Posted by hamilton | August 4, 2007 10:08 PM

Dave Pooser:

"I might not be able to get Nancy P to support a voucher system, but if I wanted her to support lowering tarriffs on imports from the Dominican Republic I might have a shot."

A good point, but the marginal nature of your example demonstrates that this sort of influence is probably limited to such minor issues.

hwc:

"Is there anything fundamentally wrong with Nancy Pelosi spending ten minutes listening to the reasons for lowering tarrifs on Dominican goods?"

I don't think so, particularly when she may be spending another ten minutes listening to a lobbyist (for a competing domestic producer?) with the opposite position.

Gordon Lightfoot:

"Poor single mothers in the ghetto are an interest group, but they aren't going to be cobbling together lobby money to get their message out any time soon."

These women already have liberal political groups lobbying for them. Not surprising, since it was LBJ-era welfare policies that subsidized single motherhood in the ghetto in the first place (compare the pre-LBJ illegitimacy rates with those in subsequent decades).

Posted by Fred | August 4, 2007 10:34 PM

Only in the realm of pure theory is Matt right that lobbyists are just stand-ins for the people they represent. But in the real world, lobbyists form a phalanx of their own; they compete for business often by getting things inserted into bills that are often more than their clients really "need" so that they can then strut their stuff. They also compete for business by proving to their clients that they are likely to get access due to their own contributions and the contributions they bundle. Taking lobbyist contributions is a means of enabling the whole sordid system; refusing to take them is admittedly not going to change the world, but it's a start.

Posted by Raymond A | August 4, 2007 11:08 PM

I couldn't agree with vorkosigan1 more:

*They know where the weak points and externalities are in our system of government, and take advantage of them.*

Having to solicit contributions from individual executives necessarily limits what affect same will have on a politician. With lobbyists, they can slew together a ton of executives to one voice and raise the volume considerably in any politicians room.

Public financing of elections. Maybe someone other than the mega rich can then run and inject some real life experience into the system.

Rethink your opinion on lobbyists Matt...they can't be good for the system, no matter how good their cause.

Posted by G Davis | August 5, 2007 1:23 AM

G Davis,

The obvious problem with public (i.e., government) financing of elections is who gets financed? Such a system is likely to further entrench incumbents and the establishment.

The WSJ editors in one of their rational editorials suggested that the super rich should be able to give as much as they want to individual candidates, provided these contributions are immediately made public on the Internet. Given that the political spectrum of America's super rich is as broad as that of the American public, this would allow talented candidates without a fund-raising infrastructure to raise money from super rich supporters who share their views.

Posted by Fred | August 5, 2007 1:39 AM

Well Fred, I would trust that the innovation of America could conquer a smallish problem like how to distribute the money.

There would have to be some sort of sorting process similar to what we're going through now. We do have, what 18 declared candidates on stages now? That's not tenable for too awfully long no matter who funds it, but all have been allowed to throw their hats in which as it should be.

Perhaps use the state primary process...allocate a certain amount of public funding for traveling to states and somehow gauge public reaction to candidates on the ground there...

I'm not the organization wizard, to be sure...and I do have faith there are some really smart folks out there that could come up with some sort of equatable system.

It couldn't be any worse than what we have now...decades of deciding between the lesser or all evils just ain't right.

Posted by G Davis | August 5, 2007 2:17 AM

Please don't clog up the internet with ignorant bloviating. If I want that I can turn on the cable news.

If you don't know much about a subject and haven't researched it then please don't post.

Regarding public financing: you don't have to solve every problem on this thread. Other people have put a lot of thought into this already. Durbin's bill is out there. Some states have enacted public financing laws already.

Posted by Bob | August 5, 2007 2:38 AM

But what's the fun in that, Bob? You're boring.

Posted by Gordon Lightfoot | August 5, 2007 2:56 AM

Obama Took 1.4 Million From Lobbyists' Firms

The LA Times reports today that even after presidential hopeful Barack Obama made a show of standing up to Washington insiders by returning donations from lobbyists, he received help raising campaign money from at least two of them.

Even as he shuns donations from lobbyists, Obama has taken more than $1.4 million this year from law and consultancy firms that have partners who are registered to lobby, a Times analysis of Obama's fundraising shows. He has received hundreds of thousands more from corporate executives while turning down money from their lobbyists.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-obama4aug04,1,4742821.story?coll=la-politics-campaign&ctrack=2&cset=t rue

Further, the Des Moines Register reports that Obama's fundraising team has used state lobbyists, former lobbyists, spouses of lobbyists and partners in lobbying firms who are not registered for specific clients to reach the rich, the Washington Post reported in April.

As a U.S. Senate candidate, Obama was no stranger to PAC donations. From 2001 to 2006, he received $1.8 million, or about 8 percent, of what he raised from PACs, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan watchdog group.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070803/NEWS09/708030378/1001/NEWS

Posted by JoeCHI | August 5, 2007 8:51 AM

Jeebus, this goo-goo anti-lobbyist viewpoint expressed by many here is ridiculously quaint.

Should Democratic candidates not take money from union PACs, or in-kind services from the same such as phone-banks? Or is that 'good' money? Or take donations from lobbyists representing teachers, nurses, or (God forbid) trial laywers?

Sorry, but campaigns cost money, a lot, and your average donation from you and me sitting at home typing blog-comments isn't enough. And, $2300 (or a bundled $20,000) from a lobbyist may get you an appointment with a legislator (or some staffer), but it isn't changing a vote.

Also, as said by others, you can refuse to take lobbyist/PAC money, but guess what? The money is still coming from the same interests.

Posted by Andruw | August 5, 2007 9:10 AM

When lobbyists can legally hold campaign fundraisers and bundle contributions for members of Congress, our system is broken--working not for the people's interests, but for the special interests.

As vorkosigian posted, "lobbyists institutionalize corruption."

Posted by fldem | August 5, 2007 11:55 AM

With the admittedly huge role money plays in getting elected/reelected, it is pretty impressive that Obama and Edwards have the confidence to run their campaigns without depending upon the goodies-pushing lobbyists.
Each of these two are already demonstrating leadership to begin changing what has been the 'insider' default game in Washington.

Posted by Donna | August 5, 2007 11:42 PM

I agree that the supposed refusal of Edwards and Obama on taking campaign contributions from registered federal lobbyists is worthless in terms of advancing public policy.

Obama and Edwards don't take money from lawyer and lobbyist Smith. Yet they gladly take money from Jones, who isn't a registered lobbyist but is Smith's partner at the same law firm - Smith & Jones.

If Obama or Edwards become President and Smith seeks a meeting with an administration official to pitch a proposal for a client, you can be sure that the official will know that the Smith & Jones firm contributed to the campaign. And of course there is nothing to prevent executives from the corporate client of Smith & Jones to donate to Obama or Edwards.

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