As this the election cycle begins to speed up following the Labor Day weekend America will begin to see the effect of lobbying and the fight against it. Lobbying is a political sensitive word and rightly so. As of 1998 43% of the men and women appointed to congress have taken lobbying jobs after their term. The first major lobbying efforts by outside interest groups were economic and related to gaining railroad subsidies in the post-Civil War era. Since then we have seen advocacy groups for identity, political issues, state and local governments and foreign governments. Although many feel that lobbyists have too much influence over our leaders and their decisions, the lobbying will continue to be significant to our domestic and foreign policies for the foreseeable future.
The economic advocacy groups that lobby inside our government were some of the first to organize. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) is the largest federation of labor unions. It has a political body not unlike a government of its own. It also has international ties to the European-based International Trade Union Confederation. In 2007 the AFL-CIO spent two million dollars on lobbying the U.S. government on various trade and labor issues.
The National Council of La Raza is the best example of an identity-based advocacy group in the media attention lately. With the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court earlier this year, the lobbyist organization received more notice than it ever had. The group, which was founded to support Hispanic advancement in society, has been attacked over allegations that it is exclusionary in its advancement of human rights. Although the topic is controversial and debatable the organization is quite extensive, based in Washington, D.C. and serving in eight other cities. It is non-profit, but receives philanthropy from major companies, such as Ford and Wal-Mart. As the fastest growing segment of our population no one can doubt the effect of this advocacy group in the future.
Political advocacy does not get any better than the late Charlton Heston and his NRA. The effect of the numerous celebrity presidents (Ulysses S. Grant being another) and the politically charged topic of gun rights and gun control make this lobby extremely important in American political life. The non-profit organization spent ten million dollars on the 2008 presidential campaign alone! Its lobbying efforts have been a continuous sway on second amendment rights and the successful bids by mostly Republican hopefuls in my generation. The endorsement of the NRA can be the difference between making or breaking a campaign. That is the power to shape policy and sway the legislative process.
No foreign government has the influence or power to push, prod and otherwise manipulate American policy like Israel. I’d rather mention the Georgian ability to affect our policy and shape future (or past) political positions with regard to Foreign Policy and specifically Russia. Randy Scheunemann, Senator McCain’s top foreign policy advisor in his run up to the 2008 election, was a lobbyist for Georgia prior to working for the Senator. In what was called a conflict of interest, Senator McCain was unequivocally involved in the Georgian Conflict. What some called smart foreign policy shaping others called overt outside influence on America’s decision-making process. Whether you take one view over the other, it is undeniable that Georgia’s investment paid out well, but not as well as they had hoped.
It is a natural product of democracy for groups of like-thinking individuals to band together in order to push their ideology further than one person could. Although it is an American reaction to be disgusted by the amount of lobbyist and politician bleed over, it is impossible to split the two. Politicians have platforms on which they stand (or risk being labeled a flip-flopper), and it is reasonable that the politician would look towards advocacy groups with similar platforms through rose-tinted glasses. The money involved in lobbying is what exacerbates the average Americans view towards the organization, sometimes with reason. No one likes to think that the American dream can be bought out, but we have yet to see the bottom to a politician’s greed.
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