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Did no one read the article?
This was actual legally defined bribery of a state lawmaker and the accused executive is going on trial.
What the article doesn't address is whether the legislation this bribe was paid for, will be repealed or impacted.
FYI it was a bill to remove AT&T's obligations as a Carrier of Last Resort in Illinois.
Well I'm not going to now!
Thanks, btw
It absolutely should be repealed. Though lately my sense of justice is skewed.
why doesn't this result in immediate repeal of the legislation if this comes out??
And remove any government contracts. Exclude them from.any future government bids for 10 years.
Revoke their corporate license. Death of corporations and criminals charges for those in charge should be on the table.
Nationalize att
That's another thing. Should telecom really not be a utility in this day and age? But we let Nestle sell us water so that is never gonna happen.
Would that not be cruel and unusual punishment? Since we're considering them individuals via citizens united, a death penalty for bribery is extreme.
Criminal charges for those in charge and those who actually did the bribery, totally tho.
Hahaha damn your right. What if we plant a few grams of cannabis in the parking lot?
FUCKIN JAIL FOR EVERYONE WHO EVER WORKED THERE
Yeah ... good luck with that considering how entrenched AT&T is is.
For example after 9/11 it was decided the country needed an interoperable public safety broadband network: The First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet).
I'll give you one guess as to which carrier got the contract to build and operate it.
It's very frustrating. Here in Ohio, there was a maybe bribery scandal on a bailout for two energy companies. The former house speaker and one or two other legislators got prison sentences.
The bailout stayed in place, however, and all Ohioans are stuck paying an extra $50 a month, just for having a fossil gas line active. If you have a gas stove, water heater, or furnace, it's fifty bucks a month just to be able to use them, plus whatever you actually use on top of that.
Bet they get fined all of 1 million dollars.
Cost of doing business as usual.
It's not like anybody in the government would actually consider a proper penalty. They need to stop having flat rates or stupidly linear fine scales with a cap. They need to make it an exponential scale with no cap, based on the net worth of the corporation. Same with the tax rate for rich people. But neither of those will ever happen because the companies and rich people write all the laws and then their puppets just sign off on them.
Read the article please.
23 million in 2022, but the former president of AT&T was personally indicted on Friday.
It was just the president for AT&T Illinois. The actual high muckety mucks won't get in any trouble.
Exactly.
Ok so what is 23mil to AT&T? Jack shit. It’s the cost of doing business, there will be no serious repercussions.
I agree, which is why it's WORSE that they were charged 23 million and still consider it the cost of doing business.
It's also like .. line 3. Literally asking for the smallest amount of effort here.
Why would they get fined for doing something that is perfectly legal and that every other company does daily?
22 grand... Are you fucking kidding me? That's all it takes? They should put att out of business for shit like this. Not a slap on the wrist here. How much did they make from bills passed due to this scheme?
TBF they got caught with 22.5k so realistically more wouldn't be feasible.
Bribe? I thought they called it lobbying in the US?
I think the correct headline should be "AT&T got outed on paying bribes to get two major pieces of legislation passed". You can bet they did not only spend bribes on just two pieces of legislation.
Hm, no mention of the “then-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan” facing any charges for accepting the bribe.
Isn't this just lobbying but in secret?
Well I mean, yeah. Nobody is surprised by this. Except that the government is actually maybe possibly thinking of considering hypothetically doing something about it.
You mean the cost of doing business?
Nothing new.
There's an actual trial about it. That is new.
I am shocked this headline didn't come up sooner
Aww, give them guys a multi-billion dollar contract! /s