So lobbying is the equivalent of murder.. but the party accepting the bribe.. that was entrusted to protect you from murderers.. should not go to prison?

Frankly, in this picture you've painted, I'm not sure what the point of this bribe accepting party is. This is like having a body guard that might shoot you if there's a higher bidder. The whole point of the body guard is to protect you from killers, but now he's shopping around for contracts on your head. It's almost like the State having a monopoly on violence is paradoxical to it's alleged end goal.

Should [a lawmaker accepting a bribe / lobbying-money to remove restrictions meant to prevent people from dying] go to prison? In some cases, yes I would probably want that to happen.

Imagine a company and a few lawmakers that via bribes/lobbying remove regulations around asbestos (which is very carcinogenic) and start building houses with asbestos (because asbestos is inexpensive). Now people are going to die in cancer, almost for sure. The company and lawmakers are, in my opinion, killing people to make money. So, they should go to prison.

So I think I want laws that prevent companies _and_ politicians/lawmakers from suggesting-to-remove and removing important environmental restrictions meant to save people's lives.

Perhaps it sounds weird with laws about what regulations/laws might be canceled. Some kind of "meta laws". One way to think about it, could be a defense-in-depth. Now it gets even harder for some evil company, to make money by destroying the environment & hurting people.

I'm not sure all this would work out well in practice though.

You're describing a bodyguard that might kill you if there's a higher bidder. And your solution is to give the bodyguard more power.

Dude. I just want you to consider that your relationship with said bodyguard is abusive and preventing you from thinking straight. And said bodyguard will never care about you more than the money his higher up friends will provide. I know this bodyguard told you a lot of lies, about always being there for you. About protecting and serving. Sorry dude, it's lip service. The bodyguard works for the highest bidder and the highest bidder isn't you or me.

The solution?? Higher a real god damn bodyguard! One with a collateralized contract and reliable arbitrator of your mutual choosing. Turns out social contracts aren't worth the imaginary paper they're written on.

Everything is carcinogenic, or poisonous - it's always only a matter of dose. Defining lobbying as murder in such a broad category as this is silly.

Actually there is a misunderstanding. I didn't write about everything — I had in mind carcinogenic stuff, dangerous enough to make people sick and kill some (in a large population). So when you write "such a broad category" and you have in mind literally everything — then that's not what I meant.

Yes, but your definition for "carcinogenic stuff" most likely would be interpreted by activists to include e.g. glyphosate - which is now classified as "category 2A possibly causes cancer" and is getting a lot of attention. In reality, category 2A also includes manufacture of art glassware, hairdressers, and shift work, and the more dangerous category 1 includes e.g. beer.

Still you can bet the activists would use our murder charge approach to attack glyphosate manufacturers, not beer manufacturers.

Interesting, didn't know beer is carcinogenic. Googled about that — apparently, although alcohol it's carcinogenic, drinking a little bit, reduces the risk for cancer (and heart attacks).

Actually personally I didn't have in mind the possibly causes cancer category. I had in mind more obviously dangerous things like asbestos, and something that was in heavy use in Europe like 30? 50? years ago but then got forbidden because it resulted in severe birth defects. [Edit: I think it's called Thalidomide, was sold as a drug named Contergan]

Some activists do "attack" beer manufacturers :-) (I found out when googling for "beer carcinogens"). And this particular beer manufacturer did apparently listen to what people said, and removed some carcinogenic caramel coloring from a beer. http://organics.org/8-beers-that-you-should-stop-drinking-im...

Of course, being carcinogenic (containing carcinogens) and actually causing cancer are not quite the same thing.

But NGO activism does not attack just the actually dangerous things; it attacks things that can be used to raise money.