
Google’s Remarkably Close Relationship with the Obama White House, in Two Charts - danielam
https://theintercept.com/2016/04/22/googles-remarkably-close-relationship-with-the-obama-white-house-in-two-charts/
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_yosefk
A nice quote:

"In 2012, staff at the Federal Trade Commission recommended filing antitrust
charges after determining that Google was engaging in anti-competitive tactics
and abusing its monopoly. A staff report that was later leaked said Google’s
conduct “has resulted — and will result — in real harm to consumers and to
innovation in the online search and advertising markets.”

The Wall Street Journal noted that Google’s White House visits increased right
around that time. And in 2013, the presidentially appointed commissioners of
the FTC overrode their staff, voting unanimously not to file any charges."

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caio1982
I don't want to shoot the messenger here but is there any other source for all
that info? I would like to read more about it but some other report
investigation that came to the same conclusions would be nice. Given some
garbage-level articles I've read at The Intercept recently I am very skeptical
about their motivations and the quality of their report.

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GauntletWizard
I'd love to see some comparison between these job moves, other companies, and
the state of the world. Oh, no, the world's second largest company by market
cap and that employes 50,000 people has had a few dozen move to government
jobs! "Suchit Metrotra from Support Engineer Google Apps GOOGLE → to Research
Assistant FEDERAL RESERVE BOARD (May 2015)". This is a mid-level support
position, and according to his linkedin profile, he left google in 2012 and
spent a year at another company before going to work for the government in
2015. This is a revolving door?

(Disclaimer: I singled out that name because I knew the name from my time at
Google. And, indeed, nothing about his job role before or after would qualify
as lobbyist, unless you consider anyone who's ever worked a government
contract a lobbyist.)

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malandrew
I'd love to see transparency here so long as those arguing for transparency
also are supportive when the proposals really are in the best interest of the
average American.

Google has gone to bat to protect the privacy of the average American and
they've pushed to open up markets with unnecessary artificial barriers to
entry protecting the incumbents. Sometimes the interests of the average person
and the commercial interests of a company align, and when that happens it's
important we know that it's happening, but are also aware that it's in our
best interests.

Even Microsoft lately has started to go to bat on behalf of the average
American by suing the government over warrantless requests for information and
abuses of the third-party doctrine.

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r00fus
Does anyone not remember the candidates' interviews at Google?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4yVlPqeZwo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4yVlPqeZwo)

The Barack Obama one was likely the most viewed, as he was relatively unknown
then.

Interesting the answers he gave and the state of politics and regulation 8+
years afterwards.

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bgilroy26
I love to see House of Cards plotlines in the wild

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gjolund
Where do you think the writers draw their inspiration from?

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gjolund
I wonder how this dynamic will change if/when Trump gets elected.

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randyrand
He'll negotiate better deals. Amazing deals. Deals that none of the current
guys would ever think of.

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spoiledtechie
This is so incredible. Googles lobbyist at its forefront of political
corruption.

