America’s Lawyer E85: If you want to know why politicians never do anything to help you, all you have to do is follow the money. A new report has found that lobbyists spent a record amount of money last year to stop progress on the issues that matter to you. Social media companies have gotten away with little to no regulations at all, and now they’ve grown into corporate giants that wield too much power – we’ll tell you why that has to change NOW. And at least 40 members of Congress have violated conflict of interest laws in the last 12 months, and not a single punishment has been doled out. All that, and more is coming up, so don’t go anywhere – America’s Lawyer starts right now.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: Hi, I’m Mike Papantonio, and this is America’s Lawyer. If you want to know why politicians never do anything to help you, all you have to do is follow the money. A new reports found that lobbyists spent a record amount of money last year to stop progress on issues that matter to you. They matter a lot in your life. And social media, well, companies have gotten away with little to no regulation at all, and now they’ve grown into a corporate giant that’s way, way too powerful. We’re gonna tell you what it’s doing to us as a culture. And at least 40 members of Congress have violated conflict of interest laws in the last 12 months, and not a single punishment. Nothing’s doled out to make these people stop what they’re doing. They’re in real terms, it’s insider trading. It’s all that and more, it’s coming up. Don’t go anywhere. America’s Lawyer starts right now.
The numbers are in, and lobbyists set a record last year by spending billions of dollars to make sure that corporations get everything they want from elected leaders in Washington. I’ve got Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins with me to talk about it. Gee, we’ve done so many of these stories over the year, but right now when it gets to $4.2 billion and you’ve got the Chamber of Commerce, who’s one of the big people that are trying to, the more immigration so they can bring in people. If the worker cuts their arm off, we’ll ship ’em back to Nicaragua or killing the possibilities of consumer lawsuits. Those are the two big things. They want to kill the right for a lawyer and a claimant to go into court and recover when a company has killed them with a bad product. That’s really big up there. And CEO wages, buddy, they’re spending a lot of money on making sure that CEO wages stay as high as possible. And last but not least, globalization. We want to globalize because we can have this work done less expensively in India, and we’re gonna make more money. It’s gonna put American workers outta work. But this is, those are the types of things we’re looking at here, right?
Farron Cousins: Yeah, absolutely. And it’s interesting, when we think of lobbyists, we think of these people that go to DC to get these favors done to benefit them, but a lot of the work that lobbyists do is to make sure things don’t happen. That’s the big thing that people really have to understand. It’s not that they want legislation to pass, it’s mostly protecting the status quo. I mean, if you’re a billionaire or if you’re a CEO or if you’re any kind of corporation in this country right now, things are great for you and they’re getting better by the day. Like with the things you mentioned here, no regulations. And that’s because they stop all that legislation. But they want to preserve that. They’ve gotta make sure that we don’t get to pass more laws where instead of 10 pharmaceuticals we can negotiate prices on, maybe we get a hundred. So they stop any kind of progress. And it is these scumbags, I’ll call them, because their job is to make.
Mike Papantonio: I’m good with that word.
Farron Cousins: Their job is to make sure that everybody watching this, that your life doesn’t get better. That is their goal in life. And they will spend, like you said, $4.2 billion in the last 12 months alone to make sure that you can’t afford your prescription drugs. You can’t put food on the table. You can’t afford to buy a house or even rent a house. That’s their job every day they go to work.
Mike Papantonio: And these legislators are out there with their hands, like a bunch of just disgusting, shameless punks taking all of the money. And you know what? You can’t miss this. The Supreme Court knew exactly what they were doing with Citizens United. Okay. They were changing the balance of power. If you read kind of the, if you just read the petitions and the briefing that was done on Citizen United, here’s what you see. The discussion was that first of all, the media is dead. Okay. There is no investigative journalists to protect consumers. That just doesn’t happen anymore. Most of the time, the lawsuit that’s brought starts the media. That’s the first thing. The second thing was that there are no regulations anymore because corporations, the US Chamber of Commerce owns most of the regulators. And so that’s the second thing that used to protect us. The third thing is that there was a balance of power on political influence until this level of money started coming in. Fourth thing, there used to be a balance with the judicial dominance. Okay. There wasn’t judicial dominance where it was all corporate, and don’t get me wrong, the corporate judges, it’s not just Republican.
Farron Cousins: Right.
Mike Papantonio: We have as many Democrats appointed that they, hey, this is a good judge. Well, it’s a good judge because they’re good on social issues maybe, but they’re terrible on consumer issues. They’ll always. So those four things occurred, Citizens United came along and the people that were saying, look, this is what’s happening. You give them all this money and it’s game over.
Farron Cousins: It is. And we’ve seen that now for far too many years where anytime we sit here, we do stories talking about, oh, it’s a good piece of legislation. This would make a difference in your life. This would protect you from this kind of pollution or this kind of toxin, or put more money in your pocket. None of it ever comes to fruition and it’s because of these lobbyists. And what they’ve also found now is, well, okay, Washington DC we’ve pretty much broken it.
Mike Papantonio: Oh, totally.
Farron Cousins: But we’ve still got states that are trying to do things that we don’t like or we need them to do things we do like. So now they’re pumping more money into the states than ever before.
Mike Papantonio: Because you can get more done local.
Farron Cousins: Exactly. And they’ve broken DC to the point they say, okay, our work here is done.
Mike Papantonio: You bunch of morons. We can’t accomplish it. This is a nuance that you and I have talked about. It’s really a nuance to this story. When they can make social media reporters or whatever you want to call it, when they stop us from telling stories like this, it’s a home run. And you know what? They’re already trying to do that. The way that they’re buying up social media, the way they’re getting legislation that supports social media that makes independents like us go away. The other thing they’re doing is they’re attacking us, just straight out attack saying that we’re somehow harmful to democracy. That David Pakman and Sam Seder and TYT and Ring of Fire and Farron Balanced and this show, that this is all hurting democracy. And they actually have people out there that are attack dogs that have come after us. Right?
Farron Cousins: Yeah. And they’ve literally said it is a threat to democracy. That’s not an overstatement.
Mike Papantonio: For us to tell stories like this.
Farron Cousins: Right. And it’s a threat to corporations because we’re exposing the truth, but a threat to democracy, we’re the only folks out there actually working to save it. So.
Mike Papantonio: Doing our best. Kind of hands behind our back.
Social media companies have been operating with little or no oversight and virtually no regulations for way too long. And it’s past time that we start holding them accountable. 230 sucks. 230 is a disaster and nobody seems to understand why. You understand why, you’ve done a lot of stories on it, let’s talk about it.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, going back to the nineties, says that, listen, if you’re a social media or if you’re a website at all, you are not held liable for something that somebody else puts on your website. Now, if I am a news organization that has a TV station, if I’m CNN and I bring on a guest and the guest says something completely defamatory, me, even though I didn’t say it as the network, I get sued for defamation and I lose, and I pay out the nose pretty big for that because of what somebody else said. Social media websites take advantage of the fact that they know they can’t get in trouble. So they allow basically this wild west mentality of anything goes, we’re not responsible, so y’all just go out there and do whatever.
Mike Papantonio: This was a Bill Clinton deal. Okay. Bill Clinton believed, his media, this press was so bad, he thought, if I make this deal with social media, they’re gonna take care of me. They’re gonna take care of Hillary. Didn’t work out like that, but that’s where 230 came from. It is, yeah, we’re gonna let you do whatever the hell you want to do, and you’re gonna be bulletproof. There’s only one exception and that has to do with copyright law. And truthfully, they could do the same thing, they could do the same thing across the board. Look, kids are at risk here. It’s not just kids, the truth is at risk, democracy is at risk when you really look at the fact of how a system can be so turned up on its head with factual stories that are way beyond being factual and all of the things that they’re doing. Nobody has called them and said, and really made ’em answer the question. Now they’ve been called before Congress several times. And every time they go, this is their line. We take user safety seriously. If I have to hear that one more time after the number of suicides that have taken place from bullying, after the attacks, personal attacks that people have to front all the time because nobody’s held responsible. This is a system outta control. They’re multi, multi-billionaires who don’t wanna spend the money to monitor. That’s what it’s about. We don’t wanna spend the money to properly monitor. They can, but they won’t.
Farron Cousins: Right. And these people who created these social media websites are now among the richest people in this country. So they have the money to do the oversight. They just don’t wanna part with any of it. But I will say too, section 230, as you said, is terrible. They cannot enjoy blanket immunity. So I’m not agreeing with the folks who say it needs to be repealed.
Mike Papantonio: No, I’m not either.
Farron Cousins: It needs, right, it needs to be rewritten. Because if we get rid of it, then what do we see at that point? We see the overreaction of social media sites. So they say, okay, if you talk about politics, you’re gone, because politics is ripe for slander and defamation. So we don’t want to run the risk. So all politics is gone, left, right, center, doesn’t matter. And that’s a real threat. Obviously, it’s a threat to what we do. It’s a threat to what so many people in this country now do.
Mike Papantonio: It can’t be absolute.
Farron Cousins: Exactly. You’ve gotta, almost to paraphrase Obama from back in the day, you gotta come at it with a scalpel instead of a sledgehammer to figure out. But it’s gotta be done.
Mike Papantonio: Right now, maybe it is a sledgehammer. Maybe that’s all that’s gonna get these people.
Farron Cousins: Well, tear it down and rebuild it to where it works for modern times.
Mike Papantonio: These folks believe they’re above the law.
Farron Cousins: They do.
Mike Papantonio: I mean, they show up in Congress with this smirk on their face. You know, we really are doing everything we can for public safety. It’s just ridiculous.
Farron Cousins: Well, it’s because part of it too is they know like, okay, well I’ve given this person $10,000, $20,000.
Mike Papantonio: Yes, yes. The last time it happened, I was looking across the people that were asking questions, they’re easily $2 million up there with those people that were asking questions of the folks that they’re supposed to be investigating and helping change.
The family of a high schooler who took her own life are now suing the school for doing absolutely nothing to stop this horrific bullying and abuse that this child suffered with and drove her to suicide. This to me, I don’t know who, his name is, Parlapanides. This is the guy who was at New Jersey, in New Jersey, Central Regional High School. Okay. Girl attacked, beat with a bottle, bruised, her face was bruised, her whole body was bruised. She was in terrible shape after these little, you know, sociopath, they are really sociopath. I mean, true sociopath, female predators. That’s what these girls were. She was on the ground kicking her. They were kicking her in the head, kicking her all over her body. Tell us what happens.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. They were assaulting her and not just assaulting her. Obviously there’s tons of witnesses all around doing nothing. It was filmed. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, it was then filmed and uploaded to social media. And as if that were not enough, she then the young woman who took her own life was bullied more online, as the video shows that she is obviously the victim here, more people pile on and send her these horrific threats. And mocking her, making fun of her, just absolutely pushed her to her absolute limits. And the school knew it. The school knew that this video was online and they did nothing. They’re actually blaming her and the family.
Mike Papantonio: Oh, yeah. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. The ugly thing is they have what they call their anti bully specialist there on staff. Okay. You have this guy, I just can’t get away from this, this guy, his name is Parlapanides. Parlapanides, I guess is how he says it. This is what he writes. Listen to this. After this family has lost their daughter. This is a quote. Now this is coming from the, the source is Daily Mail, but they got this one right because I’ve seen it in four or five different sources. The father is very, this is what he says. This is a quote from him. The father is very upset and has lost his child. So sometimes you have to eat the sandwich. Did you see that? This is what this idiot in charge of this regional, Central Regional High School says. And then the other idiots that I’m sure this fella hired, the other idiots were supposed to be anti bully specialists. They see that this is all over the internet. They know this girl has had the hell beat out of her. They know she’s whole, just hugely embarrassed. And the little sociopath, predators, the people who, the girls who did this, that if they don’t go to jail, I just don’t even know what the hell we do. Either the parents have to suffer or these little predators have to suffer. But they write and they say this, they brag about the fact of how funny the video is. And if you want the video, we’ll send it to you. It’s hilarious. This poor girl getting beat down on the ground at this high school and then leadership at the high school doing nothing about it.
Farron Cousins: Right. Well, because the high school said, well, we don’t wanna, you know, make these girls into these pariahs or whatever it was.
Mike Papantonio: Hell, they’re already pariahs. They’re gonna be, they’re gonna come up some form of criminal at some point in their life, well, if you followed them, you would see it happen.
Farron Cousins: Well, and like I said, they blamed the young woman herself. They said, well, she got into drugs. So obviously whatever happens to her, she kind of deserves it, I guess is they’re thinking. They said, oh, well, the father had had an affair.
Mike Papantonio: Six, what, six years? Seven to eight years before.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. So they’re literally shifting the blame and saying that, okay, well yes, she took her own life, but it’s not the fault of the people who beat the hell out of her and put it online. It’s because her dad had an affair and her mom was passed away. It just, it’s the most sickening thing I’ve ever seen.
Mike Papantonio: Farron, I would work for free, whoever’s handling this case, if they called me and they said, would you help try this case for free? I would do it. I would do it. I would go after these little sociopath predators with everything I had and send a hell of a message. And more importantly, I’d go after the administrator. Can you imagine an administrator writing something as horrible as that? Now that’s what’s reported. He didn’t say that to me, but that’s what’s reported. Who knows?
A new report has found that at least 40 members of Congress have violated conflict of interest laws in the past 12 months. And because nobody ever gets punished, we could see that that number continues to grow larger every year. Wow. This is, you know, go to Congress, not because you’re gonna do anything, not because you’re gonna help consumers. Not because you’re gonna pass any law that’s good for climate. Not because you’re gonna pass any laws good for healthcare. Go there because it’s a big money maker. It’s a huge money maker, isn’t it?
Farron Cousins: It is. What’s funny about this, lemme throw some numbers out here, 40 members at least that we know of, violated the Stock Act. 40. Do you know how many pieces of legislation this congress passed in that same amount of time? 20.
Mike Papantonio: Wow.
Farron Cousins: So we had twice as many violations of a federal law than we had pieces of new legislation pass the chamber. That’s how insane this is. They’re more concerned about trading their stocks and making their money than they are about actually legislating
Mike Papantonio: The numbers are staggering.
Farron Cousins: They really are.
Mike Papantonio: I mean, we did one story where we saw that it was a 286%, take the S&P, okay, and this legislator made 260, 280% higher than the S&P. Nancy Pelosi made almost 70% higher than the S&P. All of these folks are cashing in on what they know. They go to committee meetings, they learn that there’s gonna be a new war. Well, let’s go buy defense stock. Matter of fact, this one part of this that caught my eye, Rick Allen. Rick Allen from Georgia, $8.5 million in stock transactions. It took him six and a half years before he reported it. And they give these lame excuses like, well, I just, it was a mistake. It was an error, it was a clerical error, administrative error. These are actually excuses or my financial advisor, well, he’s to blame. And they know it’s a lie. I mean, it’s Democrat. It’s more Democrat, interesting on this story, it’s more Democrats doing this than Republicans. Maybe they have more money. I don’t know why. But this is not a Democrat Republican story.
Farron Cousins: No, no. This is one of those where it is, it is the left. It is the right. It is everybody almost that we have in Congress that is doing this. And they do it because as we’ve talked about before, the penalty, when they get caught, if they get caught using their insider knowledge to make $20 million on a stock trade, the penalty is $200. And in most instances, the ethics committee actually waives the fees. So there’s no fee, but okay, if you have to pay $200 to make a million, hell yeah, I’ll take that transaction all day long. Because that’s a small user fee at that point.
Mike Papantonio: I love this quote. It’s by Brian Baird. He’s a Democrat in Washington, Washington State. He says, I’m so tired of these excuses. The dog ate my homework is what all of my colleagues are saying. The dog ate my homework. I’m not responsible for this. They’re, it’s criminal conduct that you and I would be in prison for, for 10 to 20 years if we did this. If we did one of them. Much less hundreds and hundreds year after year. But they don’t go to prison for it. They get rewarded. They make more money. They’re able to come into congress paupers and leave multimillionaires. Great example, Nikki Haley, we talk about all the time.
Farron Cousins: Yeah. She actually, it was reported not that long ago, Nikki Haley just got a huge infusion of campaign cash from Wall Street to save her, even though obviously she’s got no shot at winning. But Wall Street says, we like you, here’s more cash.
Mike Papantonio: Well, why do they say that? Because she’s nothing but a corporate. I mean, she literally is. Look at her relationship with Boeing. Is she better than Trump? Probably. You know, that’s not a tough standard. But she comes into Congress, she’s a pauper, has no money. Within what, five years, she’s living in a $5 million mansion. Where’d the money come from? It came from her relationship with corporate America. That’s why you have Wall Street pumping so much money into her campaign.
Farron Cousins: Yeah.
Mike Papantonio: Farron, thanks for joining me. Okay.
Farron Cousins: Thank you.
Mike Papantonio: That’s all for this week, but all these segments are gonna be posted right here on this channel in the coming week. So make sure you subscribe. I’m Mike Papantonio, and this has been America’s Lawyer, where we tell you the stories every week that corporate media won’t tell you because their advertisers don’t allow ’em. If they tell the story, the advertisers are gonna pull the money or their political connections are so strong, either Democrat or Republican, that they’re afraid to talk about their political party. As you’ve seen on this show for years, we’re not afraid to talk about either political party. We talk about balls and strikes. Hopefully we’ll see you next time.
