Strong disagree—this does not recognize the innovation of BribeWell’s approach. Lobbying is inefficient—due to so-called “transparency” and other inefficiencies, donating $X to a campaign is much less impactful than putting $X directly in the politician’s wallet. Lobbying isn’t BribingWell because it isn’t BribingDirectly.
Lobbying is like trying to buy influence by slipping retail engagement rings to politicians. The moment those walk out of the store, those can only be sold for a small fraction of the purchase price. In this model, the politician only realizes a small fraction of the money invested. A lot goes to the wedding-diamond industrial complex, or to whoever buys the ring (and doesn’t tell the intended recipient of its origins). Plus, if Senator Jones starts selling dozens of retail engagement rings, someone may start asking awkward questions. To mitigate against this, the senator has to create various convoluted structures to create at least plausible deniability, consuming their time and further reducing yield.
Thanks, I was feeling a touch of imposter syndrome because I didn’t have a clever April 1 post, but I felt better after coming up with this one-liner while walking my dog.
Thank you, Jason, for so clearly showing all the advantages of our approach! Once we get funding from a mysterious benefactor in ~25 years, I’ll reach out to you for our “Director of Explaining BribeWell” position!
I think in the US it’s called “Lobbying” and Open Phil has spent several hundred thousand dollars there
Strong disagree—this does not recognize the innovation of BribeWell’s approach. Lobbying is inefficient—due to so-called “transparency” and other inefficiencies, donating $X to a campaign is much less impactful than putting $X directly in the politician’s wallet. Lobbying isn’t BribingWell because it isn’t BribingDirectly.
Lobbying is like trying to buy influence by slipping retail engagement rings to politicians. The moment those walk out of the store, those can only be sold for a small fraction of the purchase price. In this model, the politician only realizes a small fraction of the money invested. A lot goes to the wedding-diamond industrial complex, or to whoever buys the ring (and doesn’t tell the intended recipient of its origins). Plus, if Senator Jones starts selling dozens of retail engagement rings, someone may start asking awkward questions. To mitigate against this, the senator has to create various convoluted structures to create at least plausible deniability, consuming their time and further reducing yield.
>Lobbying isn’t BribingWell because it isn’t BribingDirectly.
Incredible
Thanks, I was feeling a touch of imposter syndrome because I didn’t have a clever April 1 post, but I felt better after coming up with this one-liner while walking my dog.
Thank you, Jason, for so clearly showing all the advantages of our approach! Once we get funding from a mysterious benefactor in ~25 years, I’ll reach out to you for our “Director of Explaining BribeWell” position!