At the Yearly Kos presidential forum, when John Edwards asked the crowd "How many people in this room have a Washington lobbyist working for you?", I was among the very few whose hand went up in response.
Because, you see, while the rest of my fellow Kossacks have been giving their nickels and dimes to ActBlue and Democratic candidates, I've been sending a few dollars, here and there, to a Washington lobbyist that I read about in the news. One of the ones working on behalf of the insurance and pharmaceutical industry. I figured that I wanted some big guns in my corner... so every now and then I throw them a few bucks.
I think of this as my own personal "Plutocracy Bonds" program.
It seemed like now would be a good time to get them on the phone and see what I can get for my money. Here's a transcript from my call, on the flip-side:
ME: "Hi, I'm Mr. Malacandra... I've been sending you guys some money, and... "
LOBBYIST: "Really! You're the guy who's been sending those teensy checks! We've all been wondering who the hell you were. No one can remember ever talking to you."
ME: "No, I just figured if you cashed my checks, you'd need to talk to me. You did, so here we are. "
LOBBYIST: "OK, you got my attention. What's up?"
ME: "A lot of my friends give money to political candidates, but I think that's too much work. if I give money to a political candidate, there are spending limits and I have to attest that I'm using my own money and that I'm an American citizen... and there are legal penalties for coloring outside of the lines. I don't have to deal with that stuff if I give my money to you. It's so much simpler.
LOBBYIST: "Huh."
ME: "I'm a website designer. An independent contractor. I know you normally deal with bigger clients, and they get hundreds of millions of dollars of goodies in exchange for tens of thousands of dollars given to you guys. I figure that if I can get a commensurate return on my small investment, I'd be in really good shape. My needs are modest."
LOBBYIST: "Oooo-kayyyyy...."
ME: "For instance, I don't want to pay taxes anymore."
LOBBYIST: "Are you incorporated?"
ME: "No"
LOBBYIST: "Well, you might want to incorporate offshore. But that's actually irrelevant to what I might be able to do for you."
ME: "Really? It doesn't hurt your ability to wield power and influence on my behalf for me to not be American?"
LOBBYIST: "Maybe when your dad was driving his Studebaker it might have been true. But you know all that stuff you hear about the "global economy"? A lot of our clients take advantage of multi-national legal status. It's something to look into. In the meantime, let me ask you a few questions. You're in the communications industry... can anything you do be considered "faith based"?
ME: "Not really"
LOBBYIST: "Too bad. It's really easy to get something signed these days if you can slip it into a faith-based initiative. How about security? Do you do anything security related?"
ME: "Uh, kinda. My clients can take orders online securely using SSL encryption. That's pretty standard for any eCommerce site."
LOBBYIST: "That's good. So, in other words, you have a business which deploys Internet Security Technology to safeguard and promote interstate commerce. We could fold that into a defense appropriation bill and get you some subsidies, or at the very least, tax incentives. Do any of your competitors work in the same building with you, or nearby?"
ME: "No. I work out of my home. There's no one else doing web development in my neighborhood."
LOBBYIST: "That's fantastic. We can generalize the benefit to any business that fits your description within a certain geographical area, so it's like an enterprise zone. It's harder for people to figure out who's benefiting if we keep it general like that."
ME: "Really? You can do that?"
LOBBYIST: "Sure. The tax laws are full of highly specific language like that to benefit our clients."
ME: "Don't the legislators get in trouble for passing laws like that?"
LOBBYIST: "These are part of huge packages. They're not on record voting for your subsidies: as far as they're concerned, they can tout that they've passed "regional infrastructure improvements" which benefit the community.
ME: "And no one catches on?"
LOBBYIST: "No one reads budget bills. God, that'd suck the soul right out of anyone. In fact, no one wants to write them, either, which is why we're happy to do it. We help out the elected officials by providing them the language for the bills. It relieves effort from their overburdened staffers."
ME: "What do their staffers do if they don't have to read and write the bills?"
LOBBYIST: "Other constituent services. Like answering angry phone calls. In any case, having us relieve their workload is a win/win: it helps the representatives, and it helps our clients."
ME: "I guess the people who lose are the ones footing the bill"
LOBBYIST: "Well, they can always hire their own lobbyist."