
Larry Lessig’s Long Walk - steven
https://medium.com/backchannel/larry-lessigs-long-walk-b96d80d34972
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nraynaud
I'm wondering what his take on the French system is. Basically, there is a
limit on how much candidates can spend, and the State refunds the candidate
(on certified expense report) if a certain score is reached during the vote.
Getting money from a corporation is an offense, spending too much is an
offense, cooking the books is an offense, getting undeclared money is an
offense.

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dantheman
Money is normally, needed by challengers - incumbents have a lot of
advantageous including notoriety. If anything the US should make laws to
enhance the challengers, not solidify incumbents.

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rtpg
just by the way, you get your funding refunded at about 5% of the vote, so
it's not like the challengers have little access to the funding.

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hoggle
I remember when I first heard about Lessig and his efforts regarding Copyleft
at the university of technology here in Vienna, that was almost a decade ago -
glad to read that he's still advancing even further, trying to change things
for the better. A brilliant man and important role-model not only for people
in computer science or law.

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dantheman
Larry Lessig's approach is fundamentally misguided: 1\. It increases
complexity and discourages participation in the election system - campaign
finance regulations are anti-free speech.

2\. It treats the symptom, not the problem. The symptom is that people will
spend a lot to get people important to them into office. The problem is that
the government controls so much money and so many things, that it is in your
best interest to try influence it so that 1. the money comes to you and 2. the
laws and regulations favor you.

3\. The centralization of power at the Federal level exacerbates this problem,
since there is one main body that you are trying to influence instead of lots
of smaller ones.

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jval
1\. Is money really speech? If so then there's a lot of laws that need to be
overturned. Not to mention you can't hold 'free speech' up as a sword to swat
away anything that affects speech (libel? slander? copyright violations?). The
idea of a constitutionally protected right to free speech is to stop the
government from silencing debate. But limiting people from handing money to
members of congress isn't stopping your ability to voice your opinion at all,
it's just limiting your ability to influence your member of congress by
donating more money than the next guy. If anything it increases freedom of
speech - it allows all people to voice their views in a marketplace of ideas
where the amount of money in their bank accounts is irrelevant, and they are
assessed on the merits of their arguments alone. The current situation allows
every person to speak, but one person to hold a megaphone.

2\. The problem you've identified is the fact that there is a government, or
that powerful people exist. There will always be powerful people, and
hopefully there will always be government, and it will always be in your
interests to influence those powerful people so that they can help you out. So
in any system where there is a government, there needs to be a robust system
of checks and balances to ensure that representatives act in the interests of
the public (which is the idea behind representative democracy) rather than the
interests of their private funders.

3\. Yes, of course it does, but again, that is just a symptom of checks and
balances failing. In a system where there is a perfect representative
democracy and a strong constitution, the people will never vote for a federal
government larger than it needs to be. In the system we have now, the federal
government swells in size no matter which party is in government (just depends
whether it is the public service, or the military that grows). Private
interests fuel this effect and governments wave their hands to make it look
like cuts are being made, but they're not.

Lessig has nailed the arguments around why campaign finance reform is
necessary - whether he's going to be successful is in question but I think
most legal experts can see that the system is broken, with money being the
core of the problem.

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dantheman
1\. Can Oprah, or any famous person, support/campaign for a candidate? How is
her cashing on her celebrity any different than a person funding an
advertisement? And the current laws to a large extent support the idea
money=speech. Lessig's group couldn't even follow the campaign laws that
already exist ([http://www.campaignfreedom.org/2014/11/20/fec-complaint-
mayd...](http://www.campaignfreedom.org/2014/11/20/fec-complaint-mayday-pac-
violated-campaign-finance-laws/))

2\. The problem I've identified is that the federal government has grown too
large and does too many things. This is the problem, powerful people will be
powerful and have an influence on society - through fame, money, etc.

3\. Reducing the scope of the government could easily be accomplished if the
commerce clause was read in a different way. If granting new power to the
federal government required constitutional amendments then it would be better
-- prohibition required an amendment, why don't modern drug laws?
Additionally, returning the selection of senators to the state government
instead of a popular vote would also be be an improvement.

I don't think he has nailed the arguments, I think he fundamentally simplifies
and distorts the case. Money is a symptom, the problem is the
size/scope/breadth of action.

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vec
> This is the problem, powerful people will be powerful and have an influence
> on society - through fame, money, etc.

Absolutely, but that's exactly why the government needs to be large and do
lots of things. Take minimum wage for example. Assume that tomorrow the
government revoked the power to control wages. What happens next?

Fast food chains and big box stores would push their wages as low as the
market will bear. Some employees will quit, but a lot will stay because
working 80 hours a week and living in abject poverty is still better than
literally starving. There's still a minimum wage, it's just now being set by
corporate entities that don't (and shouldn't) have any motivations beyond
their own company's self interest.

Or maybe the employees unionize. They get organized and set terms for as high
a wage as they can extract from the employers. The employee's quality of life
goes up, but the business owners now have no recourse but to pay the demanded
wages or close. And the new employment contracts start including clauses about
mandatory union membership (including dues). Again, a minimum wage is being
set by someone, just not someone who has (or should have) any interest in the
larger economic repercussions.

The power exists, and it's going to be wielded by somebody somewhere. The
government, at least, is ostensibly motivated by the best interests of the
populace at large. That interest is, of course, frustrated as often as its
honored in the real world. Still, I don't see how taking power from an
institution that only intermittently pursues my best interests and handing it
to an institution that never does is in any way an improvement.

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mceoin
Is anyone planning to walk?

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soroushjp
Seriously considering buying a ticket to NH right now for the walk

