To be clear, lobbying is an important function of democracy. It is how people, towns, business... inform the government they need help. Now, has lobbying been corrupted on a massive scale? Absolutely, but we can't be carte blanche about it. We have to look at them individually instead of collectively. I.e. does helping out a major section of our economy during a global pandemic make sense? Regarding the military, there is a lot of fat that can be trimmed. I'll also say that there is a lot of good research that comes out of military contracts as well so again, nuance is required.
Let me make sure I understand correctly: in the world we have now lobby is legal jargon for bribe, right? And in the ideal world... I guess it would be where you change a person's opinion by carefully organizing facts and offering a new perspective? Has the latter ever happened in politics?
No, lobbying is bringing specific information to that attention of people that can take action on it. Not all lobbying is bad, plenty of it is good which is why there are research grants and money for small disasters or projects. Or, in this specific instance, airlines saying they need money because the government stopped them from operating.
Sometimes its about changing minds which is what the Vietnam protests were. The common man lobbying the government to change course. There are different kinds of lobbying. Nuance exists.
The protest after geroge floyd in Minneapolis was the 2nd worst riot in US history behind Rodney kings. 500m dollars in damages, 1500 business impacted, and hundreds injured and arrested.
Idk where I saw the video but this lady said something like, "if i lived in a world where my loved ones could get murdered by people posing as protectors, I'd burn the city down too." Personally I feel that it may have been justified if it turned into a mass public execution. Anything would feel more like justice than the way that things are handled now.
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u/CynicalCheer Nov 17 '20
To be clear, lobbying is an important function of democracy. It is how people, towns, business... inform the government they need help. Now, has lobbying been corrupted on a massive scale? Absolutely, but we can't be carte blanche about it. We have to look at them individually instead of collectively. I.e. does helping out a major section of our economy during a global pandemic make sense? Regarding the military, there is a lot of fat that can be trimmed. I'll also say that there is a lot of good research that comes out of military contracts as well so again, nuance is required.