Buying Political Protection

It’s the American way. Companies buy political protection. It's the cost of doing business. Banks, manufacturers, merchants and industrial companies have always done it. Now, the oligarchs of high tech have discovered the magical formula. As regards the modern political world, that is.

That would be: give generously to the Democrats and they will protect you. Republicans are not going to bust your trusts. Democrats might. The Republicans will not crack down on your lack of diversity. The Democrats might do so. Thus, give generously to the Democratic Party. They will talk the talk, but when it comes to walking the walk they will walk the other way.

Apparently, Elizabeth Warren did not get the message. She has been accusing the high tech oligarchs of engaging in less-than-competitive practices. The party has been trying to tell her to shut up.

Bloomberg reports:

Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren had no problem naming names in her June 29 antitrust speech, calling out Silicon Valley giants Google, Apple and Amazon.com for inhibiting competition.

But fellow Democrats might not be as forthright about biting the hand that feeds them, even in the party’s renewed quest to break up monopolies across U.S. markets.

Big Tech’s role as both lobbyist and Democratic donor makes it harder for the party to deliver on promises to preserve market competition, according to antitrust advocates. 

The same thing happened to former Clinton administration Labor Secretary, Robert Reich.

But, let us not forget diversity. Silicon Valley is not exactly diverse. Its employees are largely white and Asian males. Power is not distributed equally across all racial and ethnic groups. 

Sheryl Sandberg does not run a company where men and women are equally represented at all levels of Facebook. Since she has the power to do something about it, her failure to do so suggests that she would rather see other company, her competitors, adopt her policies. 

To be fair, the companies have explained that they are hard at work on the problem. But, you will never hear a discouraging word about their hiring practices from the social justice warriors in the Democratic Party. They have been bought. The oligarchs who run these places did not get to be as rich and powerful as they are without knowing how to play the spread… as they say.

They know that the only threat to their business practices is the Democratic Party, and they have been smart enough to buy protection.