Recently there was a big news story in Oklahoma: lobbyists spent $300,000 on legislators.
Is that too much? Too little? We don't know from the story.
This expose was written by an “investigative journalist” who got the info from a form lobbyists are required to file and is available to anyone. Pretty difficult “investigation,” isn't it?
Tellingly, the writer says: “Capitol watchers concede a meal or gift may not sway a legislator, but it builds a relationship that gives those lobbyists access and influence the average voter will never have.”
Lobbyists get access to legislators, whether they buy any lunches or not, because it is not possible for a legislator to see each individual voter in a state like Florida, with 20 million people. Most of the legislators I know, however, are pretty accessible.
By the way, a teachers' union lobbyist was one of the people who got access in Oklahoma.
The liberal media, which devotes a lot of ink to convincing voters that lobbyists are evil, does not see anything wrong with that. They rail instead about the “special interests,” by which they mean those representing businesses.
Trust me. The interests of the teachers' unions are as “special” as any business. More special, perhaps. They want money from the pockets of Florida residents. Lots of it.
Businesses generally are trying to persuade legislators to leave them alone; not heap more taxes and regulations (which are taxes) upon them.
A lobbyist is a single person who represents a large number of people. He meets with a legislator, who also represents a large number of people.
This is evil?
Sounds more like efficiency to me.
Another indication of the preoccupation the media have with lobbyists was the flurry of stories about a speech by Jeb Bush, who is running for high political office.
Bush wasn't bashing lobbyists, he merely said that more controls should be put on their spending and that there should be a ban on former politicians returning to haunt the legislative halls as lobbyists. (Both remedies have been tried, with little indication that they have done any good.)
Fact is, newspapers revile lobbyists because lobbyists are competition. Editorial writers want to be the only ones who influence politicians. Newspapers have their own highly paid lobbyist in Tallahassee, who fights vigorously any attempt to protect the privacy of Floridians.
So the media's dislike of lobbyists, who provide politicians with valuable information, is understandable. What I don't understand is the aversion some ordinary voters have to them, other than as learned behavior from the constant media bombardment.
Maybe if they understood that there are as many lobbyists working on their behalf as against them, it might be different. For example, but for the NRA, the Second Amendment probably would be toast.
Atlantic magazine, which would love to ban the NRA, proposes a solution to the lobbyist “problem” -- greatly increase the number and salaries of congressional staffers. This, it says, would allow politicians to “think for themselves.”
Seriously. They said that.
Lloyd Brown was in the newspaper business nearly 50 years, beginning as a copy boy and retiring as editorial page editor of the Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville. After retirement he served as a policy analyst for Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
