
Spouse of Ring exec among lawmakers trying to weaken California privacy law - close04
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/09/spouse-of-ring-exec-among-lawmakers-trying-to-weaken-calif-privacy-law/
======
jedberg
In today's "team based" politics, politicians have figured out that perceived
conflicts of interest no longer matter to their chances for reelection.

Her opponent can run ads that say "She proposed laws that made her husband's
company richer" and it would probably barely affect her outcomes, as long as
she has the D next to her name.

Amusing side note, she is my parent's representative, and I'm sure they would
not care one bit about this as long as she's a Democrat.

~~~
jjoonathan
That's what primaries are for?

~~~
PorterDuff
I would think that primaries would vastly favor incumbents, to a greater
degree than a general.

~~~
jjoonathan
Yes, but that's a different issue from partisanship.

------
Porthos9K
Is using your political office to benefit your spouse's business a criminal
offense in California? If not, it damned well should be. This is pretty
blatant corruption.

~~~
75dvtwin
> Is using your political office to benefit your spouse's business a criminal
> offense in California? If not, it damned well should be. This is pretty
> blatant corruption.

Receiving bribes and 'integrating' them into economy, through a network of
relatives, is not that uncommon, unfortunately.

More sophisticated forms take 250K per hour speech fees, book+documentary
'deals', and buying expensive property much cheaper than market price (from
the willing 'donors').

To find info on links between a politician and his/her bribe loundering
network, you have to use non-google/non-yahoo search engine. And plugin the
names of the relatives.

As examples, Pick federal Congress representatives from your district that
have not changed for, say, 7-10 terms or more, and that live 4mln+ homes. And
do the search.

Politicians who sit on the committees dispensing money (eg aid), or government
contracts tend to be more corrupt (proportional to how much money they oversee
being dispensed out).

~~~
sjg007
>As examples, Pick federal Congress representatives from your district that
have not changed for, say, 7-10 terms or more, and that live 4mln+ homes. And
do the search.

How about an example? Your claims are extraordinary..

~~~
scottlocklin
Dianne Feinstein is a good example; I only know about this from living in
Berkeley for 20 years, and hearing about her corruption as it relates to her
husband's real estate business (which impacted a lot of Berkeley landmarks).

The claims are reality. American politics is absurdly, laughably corrupt and
has been for a long time. I've said this for years: everything we accuse the
Russians (our evil doppelgangers) of has been true here for a long, long time.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
The purple states are much better since all the politicians are on thin ice at
all times.

~~~
scottlocklin
True enough, and one of the reasons I moved to one after Berzerks. At this
point, I'll probably continue my migration out of the country entirely if I
can pull it off.

------
uptown
One of the more interesting features announced by Apple at WWDC was HomeKit
Secure Video. The basic idea is that home security footage could be stored in
iCloud in encrypted form, preventing 3rd party access. Has any camera
manufacturer announced support for this feature yet?

~~~
casefields
Logitech, Netatmo, Eufy, and Robin.

[https://www.imore.com/these-companies-will-support-
homekit-s...](https://www.imore.com/these-companies-will-support-homekit-
secure-video)

------
saagarjha
I'm not sure which is worse: this being a conflict of interest, or her
personally believing that we should weaken data privacy laws.

~~~
close04
The conflict of interest itself would have a far less impact on the regular
person than the weakening of privacy laws. In this case I think the issues
amplify each other.

------
close04
Not distancing herself from the action/decision that favors her husband and
the company he's involved with is the very definition of a conflict of
interest.

Her inner intention is less important because it is hard to provide clear
evidence for or against it (absent some sort of recorded evidence). It creates
a situation of uncertainty and to avoid this you are usually required to
disclose any detail that could cause even the appearance of a conflict of
interest (you are married to the person who benefits from your action), and
remove yourself from the decision making position.

So for example using public money to buy the very best available product on
the market from your spouse's company is still a conflict of interest. You are
expected to withdraw and let an impartial person take over. If the product is
good then the evaluation will have the same result but there will be no
suspicion that you tried to influence the result in your interest.

------
buran77
Anyone know what kind of ethics framework these guys adhere or commit to as
part of having that public function?

------
otterley
Primary source: [https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/15/california-tech-
pr...](https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/15/california-tech-privacy-
ring-1496125)

------
squarefoot
Since the technology name rang a bell (pun unintended) it should be noted that
the old GNU Ring softphone (now called Jami) is a privacy sensitive
decentralized Skype-Like software which has absolutely nothing to do with this
thing.

[https://jami.net/](https://jami.net/)

------
gumby
Term limits make activity like this less of a problem for the perpetrator.

