I follow Lawrence Lessig on twitter and saw this tweet so I went. It was the start of a new lecture series In the Dock, Lawrence Lessig interviews Jack Abramoff about corruption, what's not to like?
I had seen Abramoff on 60 Minutes recently so I knew he had written a book about corruption in Washington and at least seemed repentent. I haven't read his book yet and in fact still haven't read Lessig's latest, though I own it and got it signed tonight.
So Lessig started by describing two stories from Abramoff's book. First how he worked on getting the MX Missle program passed Congress and how one Congressman in particular said I will vote for this bill if you do this thing in my district (I missed the details). The other story was him trying to get into a particularly popular entertainment law class at Georgetown. He got the professor sports tickets and a lunch at the white house via a friend (again, I'm not sure on the details). Both worked. He learned to bring extraordinary means and often irrelevant benefits to achieve a goal.
He said (and I agree) "Not all politics is corrupt and not all lobbying is corrupt" but Lessig followed up on the irrelevant part, particularly when it's money in the form of cash or contributions. Abramoff told a story about Tom DeLay. He wanted some money from Walmart but they said they didn't want to sully themselves with politics. They came one day wanting help with a road access issue and he said he didn't want to sully himself with it. Microsoft was in DeLay's office wanting something and DeLay told this story and said "and they'll never get anything from him". The next day Microsoft gave $100,000 to the party (or something).
DeLay isn't the only one doing this but he was nicknamed The Hammer. Lessig asked if it was always like this and Abramoff said it wasn't always this subtle. LBJ would way where's your $100,000 in cash? Now a Congress member will say "I'm having a fundraiser tomorrow night..." and that's code that they want a donation.
There are also non-money things they do. Now interests will use leverage to set up a congressional hearing for their enemy. Hearings take weeks to prepare for and this can cost a million dollars or more. They're always designed to achieve something that's never expressed. They can destroy your reputation or put you in jail for perjury or contempt (there's even a cell in building).
It's more important for a lobbyist to have influence on the staffers than the Congressman. This goes back to Lessig's point that Congress is a farm league for K Street (lobbyists). Daniel Webster had no staff. They wrote their own bills. Now the ones that make the decision or give you access are the staff. Most members are lazy, they don't want to do the work or read the bills, and they want to be on TV. Abramoff didn't hire members (only once as a favor and the guy was useless) but hired staff. At first he would say can you start tomorrow, then he learned to say "I want to hire you when do you want to leave the hill?" Even if they said in two years, Abramoff now owned him in the mean time and the guy had more access to things during that time than Abramoff's own staff.
He said he didn’t innovate his techniques, he learned everything he did though he may have pushed boundaries. His conviction had nothing to do with these things, they weren't illegal. It's not what’s illegal that’s the problem it's what’s legal that's the problem.
His suggested reforms in the book are:
- Eliminate entirely any contribution by lobbyists or contractors, anyone who gets a specialized benefit from government.
- eliminate the revolving door for members or staff (they can't become lobbyists)
- term limits (three House terms, two Senate terms)
- He wants to repeal the 17th amendment (direct election of senators)
- all laws need to apply to congressmen (now exempt from some but I'm not sure which though see this note from factcheck.org)
The important ones are the first two which take the money out of the system and the promise of future employment. Abramoff figures that with these reforms, lobbyists would be forced to lobby on the merits and philosophy of the issues.
Lessig wondered about the details of such a system. How do you determine what is a specialized benefit and could someone still get around that? Abramoff cited examples of legalizing pot which would affect everyone equally. Lessig mentioned cutting taxes on the rich and would the rich be banned from contributing for that and Abramoff said the current debate is about lowering taxes for all it's just the rich that benefit the most from that. But Abramoff wasn't firm on these, he said he wasn't a law crafter and would be find leaving such details to others, the point was to take away money from a lobbyist's arsenal. He was also open to Lessig's idea of a voucher system for small campaign contributions.
He then took questions from the audience, I only got notes on a few of them.
Someone asked that since MA just legalized casino gambling, what should we be on the look out for from the lobbyists? He didn't know anything about the MA law but he said all gambling is political and it's easier to stop than pass so it's remarkable it got through. We should probably be trying to pass a law that prevents the industry from donating money to any political level. That seems unlikely but otherwise the gambling industry will own the state. They will probably want to consolidate regulation, make it so it can't be undone, allow expansion, but never allow a fourth casino.
Another good question was how do Congressmen determine the prices they want? Lessig followed up saying it's an important question because the price seems far too low and it's an argument that money really isn't corrupting the system because the ROI is so high. Abramoff said they ask for what they think they can get and it's low because they're dealing in stolen goods.
Someone else asked how do you corrupt a new member? Congressman first meet their leadership who say your seat is important to us. You must first retire your debt, meet these lobbyists who can help you do that. Maybe they avoid it for a few years but after a few years they are in. They sell their vote for a glass of water. If someone does something nice to you it's natural instinct to do something nice for them.
In response to some question he told the story of when his story first broke. He was in such denial, in such another world that he didn't even realize it as a problem. Previous stories talked about how he charged his clients a lot and they put it on their web site as advertising. Their initial response to the first Washington Post story was asking if they should put it on the website too! Then his process was that it would blow over, or it wasn't a big deal, that everyone was doing it, just not as well, etc. It took him a long time to come to terms with the fact that his actions and the system were completely corrupt and being inside he had no idea.
Based I that I asked my question. I asked if members of Congress and their staff are as in denial as he was. He said absolutely. They see someone go to jail for insider trading, exactly what they're doing and they make connection and are happy that the guy is going to jail. It's just a completely different world. He said he's still occasionally talks to a few congress members though they don't want it known that they're talking to him. I wondered how after his conviction and jail term he still has so much more access than an average citizen.
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