• circuscritic
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    7 months ago

    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    What the article doesn’t address is whether the legislation this bribe was paid for, will be repealed or impacted.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.

    • @[email protected]
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      487 months ago

      And remove any government contracts. Exclude them from.any future government bids for 10 years.

    • TurtleJoe
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      77 months ago

      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.

      • @[email protected]
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        147 months ago

        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.

    • @[email protected]
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      247 months ago

      Read the article please.

      23 million in 2022, but the former president of AT&T was personally indicted on Friday.

      • @[email protected]
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        247 months ago

        It was just the president for AT&T Illinois. The actual high muckety mucks won’t get in any trouble.

      • @[email protected]
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        97 months ago

        Ok so what is 23mil to AT&T? Jack shit. It’s the cost of doing business, there will be no serious repercussions.

        • @[email protected]
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          77 months ago

          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.

    • @[email protected]
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      7 months ago

      Why would they get fined for doing something that is perfectly legal and that every other company does daily?

  • @[email protected]
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    427 months ago

    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?

    • Hegar
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      167 months ago

      Honestly, this country had more humanity when the mafia ran it than today’s Wall Street reptiles.

      Monsanto execs have a higher body count than many war criminals who set out to commit genocide, for example.

    • @[email protected]
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      77 months ago

      I forget which case it was but politicians were accepting 10k amounts for votes. A quick whip round could get that money.

    • @[email protected]
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      17 months ago

      I can only assume you’re not referencing this article in your rant, because the guy responsible for this one is under criminal indictment for it

  • @[email protected]
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    167 months ago

    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.

  • @[email protected]
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    157 months ago

    Hm, no mention of the “then-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan” facing any charges for accepting the bribe.

  • @[email protected]
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    57 months ago

    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.

  • snownyte
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    27 months ago

    Aww, give them guys a multi-billion dollar contract! /s