09.05.10
Microsoft’s Veteran Suzan DelBene ‘Part of the Problem’ in D.C.
Summary: How former Microsoft employees who become politicians facilitate the company’s corruption of the government
A NEW post titled “DelBene: Reichert ‘part of the problem’ in D.C.” has just been published in the Microsoft-boosting Seattle P-I, which is defunct as a news site (for about 2 years now). But who is DelBene? Here’s who it is:
On the surface, Suzan DelBene’s challenge of Rep. Dave Reichert has a familiar look. In 2006 and 2008 Reichert beat Darcy Burner, a Democrat who worked at Microsoft who had no prior elected experience. DelBene is a Democrat who was an executive at Microsoft and other tech companies who also has never held office.
Microsoft has littered the political system with former employees who are now doing favours to Microsoft*. A few months ago we showed Microsoft crawling into bed with Washington in this particular way while the Seattle Times conveniently ignored it. Microsoft’s former manager, Mr. Hunter, used his political position to facilitate Microsoft’s tax evasion, essentially legalising it. Nothing was ever done to resolve it and a former Microsoft employee who protested about it has not been active for months. Maybe he gave up trying. The Gates family is meanwhile working to ensure that its own bank account remains resistant to taxation. Later in the week we will show that Bill Gates’ father is still working on it right now.
How sad it must be when a company as abusive as Microsoft gets into a position where it controls the government. It’s quite a blazing saddle to sit on. Later in the week we will show new evidence demonstrating the relationship between the banking industry and Microsoft (the banking industry too is notoriously close to the government). Citi is one Microsoft friend which now appears to also be a partner in a finance site (good for verification):
Bundle, whose other backers include Microsoft Corp and Morningstar Inc, currently allows consumers to compare their spending habits with those of other users, based on data from government sources and Citigroup’s credit card unit.
We covered this before. Another thing we illustrated numerous times in the past is that Tim O’Reilly and his ilk play along with Microsoft and in this new case even assist the company’s lobbying of government. Typical O’Reilly. Just mention money and/or influence.
As a capacity crowd at the Microsoft New England Research & Development Center in Cambridge’s Kendall Square settled into their seats one evening in August, Laurel Ruma stood to the side of the podium, previewing her five-minute presentation.
[...]
At the Microsoft event, a gathering of people involved in mapping and location technologies, Ben Berkowitz, talked about co founding an online service called SeeClickFix to allow citizens to report problems such as potholes and graffiti to city governments. (The service is available on Boston.com.)
[...]
There was also some Gov 2.0 skepticism at last month’s event at Microsoft center in Cambridge.
It’s easy to find a lot of Microsoft at O’Reilly events. Why? Because it funds them [1, 2, 3]. █
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* Sometimes they are hired by Microsoft. In general, Microsoft also loves hiring journalists and this brand new example is no exception:
The former journalist became the chief executive of a Minneapolis firm with 3M, Microsoft among its clients.
