Americans have become so used to seeing people in high places practice corruption and commit crimes,

that they have come to accept them as normal behavior, and no longer
think of them as crimes. For example:

Lobbying, itself, is paying people to influence Congress. This seems
to be a half-way bribery at the very least, and it leads to the
corruption we see every day. But lobbying has been around since forever.
So we are used to seeing it from childhood on. Nobody thinks of it as
corruption, but it is corruption. It certainly has been corrupting our
congresspeople over the past two centuries. Wouldn't you agree? Why
hasn't lobbying been thrown out years ago?

Do we wish to continue to accept this as lawful behavior, and let it
corrupt our congressmen and women ad infinitum?

about how somebody did a prank about trying to lobby in Parliament just like we do here...... and the public there went crazy.

Maybe somebody here remembers it better than me.

The question, for me, is, how do you change a corrupt system of government, when everyone involved in the corruption is well-served by it?

That is, if you stand to gain as long as the existing system remains in place, you are going to do everything in your power to stand in the way of reform. But if Congress doesn't reform itself, there is no outside force that can do it.

I'm feeling real pessimistic today, but when I think about the corruption of DC, I am not optimistic about the future of our society.

really going on, and how lobbying is destructive to our whole nation and society - morally,
spiritually, and in our everyday lives!

If the majority of Americans really come to understand this, a ground-swell of demands
for change could occur.

This will take a long, long time, of course -- if it should ever happen at all.

nt

"Current TV" on which Keith Olbermann will begin broadcasting this late spring?
This will be just a
beginning. Hope it will catch fire -- however long that will take!

But we'll have to keep on repeating and repeating, until it gets hammered home.
The Repubs. are so successful with their repetitions -- even with their lies --
should truth be more easily successful?

I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but in this perfect world with no lobbyists, how would one "lobby" for bills to be passed and things to get done in congress?

Lobbying, I think, is just a result of us having 535 people representing over 300 million. "Hey I'm Joe, I represent the 1 million members of (insert special interest group) and I want to talk to you about what my members are interested in." It is simply the consolidation of voices into a few who represent their interests to congress. Unions, reproductive rights advocates, civil rights advocates, and other progressive causes are all lobbyists too. So the idea that lobbyists are inherently "corrupt" is questionable in my mind, but I encourage you to make the case to me.

that way. They are the ones who bring about corruption.

There is nothing wrong with each individual letting his/her congressperson,
senator know how s/he feels about certain matters s/he is interested in.

How do some of the other democratic countries govern without lobbyists?

senators and congressmen directly, can't they? We are already doing this,
but in rather small numbers. That, I understand, is what's happening in those
countries that have no lobbyists. The result is far less corruption -- a very
worthwhile result.

or gifts of small appliances with the receipts taped onto the box.

Lobbyists exist for pro choice issues, progressive issues, Social Security, health care for all, etc.

They meet with members of Congress and staffers to convince them to see our side of the coin. Yes, corporate lobbyists are scum, but there are liberal lobbyists too that don't get paid a quarter of what corporate lobbyists make and work for progressive issues.

aware of the negative qualities of lobbying -- but not enough to make a
difference. And it is an awesome job to change something so ingrained
into our psyches.

If criminals are allowed to walk then it's obvious that crimes don't really matter, that some people are above the law. The idea that high crimes can just be put behind us is absurd and only invites more crime in all walks of life.

With hierarchy.

We are in some noticeable ways worse than the Europeans when
It comes to influence.

It's not new - except we view it at the sunset of our empire.

What loathe about moderates is their absolute reluctance to deal with reality.

through appeasement. Nothing can be further from the truth. Neocons
recognize only two things: money and power. Nothing else. They can
be made to fear power. But appeasement only makes them laugh at you
-- with them its the proverbial "give them an inch and they'll take a
mile."

and the most ruthless of them have excelled by repeating it, generally with the approval of Republican types who admire the Almighty Dollar.

There should be and I believe there is something in place to limit how money is spent though..While I have the right to sit down with my Representative and present my case, I don't have the right to send him on expensive golf trips or buy him tickets for the Superbowl. It is one thing for me to pick up the tab at a luncheon, but quite another to somehow spend or promise to spend millions for their campaign.

individual citizen and what a paid professional lobbyist does!

--allowing the Bush administration off the hook set a precedence.

back in January of 2007.