Amazon doesn't like FTC chair Lina Khan's views, wants her off investigations:
Amazon filed a 25-page petition today with the Federal Trade Commission asking that Chairwoman Lina Khan recuse herself from antitrust investigations into the company.
Khan, a frequent critic of Amazon and other Big Tech firms, was appointed FTC chair less than two weeks ago. Though there has been plenty of speculation about her first moves, her short tenure to date means she hasn't had much opportunity to file lawsuits or announce investigations. Amazon's petition shows that its legal team hasn't sat idle since her nomination as commissioner and subsequent appointment as chair.
"Although Amazon profoundly disagrees with Chair Khan's conclusions about the company," Amazon wrote in the petition, "it does not dispute her right to have spoken provocatively and at great length about it in her prior roles. But given her long track record of detailed pronouncements about Amazon and her repeated proclamations that Amazon has violated the antitrust laws, a reasonable observer would conclude that she no longer can consider the company's antitrust defenses with an open mind."
Khan made a name for herself four years ago when she published a paper in a law journal. Titled "Amazon's Antitrust Paradox," the paper made the case that current antitrust laws have fallen short as tech platforms have risen to dominance. She argued that prices are a poor yardstick with which to measure anticompetitive behavior and market power, especially among platform companies like Amazon. The peculiar economics of platforms means that companies are happy to forgo profits in the name of growth, which leads to predatory pricing, she said. And because the very nature of platforms allows companies to control access to various products and services, it creates incentives for companies to favor their own products over rivals.
[...] That Amazon has come out guns blazing suggests that the company thinks some of its behavior will likely reach the FTC's inbox, if it hasn't already. The FTC's agenda isn't necessarily set by the chair, Harvard Professor Shane Greenstein told Ars when Khan's appointment was announced. Rather, it's shaped by consumer complaints, merger proposals, and so on. The FTC would need a complaint to act on if it were to take action against Amazon.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @01:35PM (1 child)
What's the point of having killer warehouse robots if you can't use them for black ops?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @01:46PM
Do it on July 20 and Bezos will have the perfect alibi.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @01:53PM (4 children)
A fundamental bad thing for a monopoly to do is to use a monopoly position in one industry to help them aquire a monopoly position in another.
Like using a railroad transportation monopoly to take over the things they are transporting.
Or perhaps in this case, like using a merchandizing monopoly to take over the production of the things they are selling.
Kind of Amazon's current expansion business plan. But in fairness, perhaps also Wallmart's.
If the FTC goes after Amazon now, why didn't they also go after Walmart when they were killing all the mom and pop local retail?
What sort of remedy are we talking about here?
Better deals for the merchandizers on Amazon, or maybe Amazon North, South, East and West competing with each other.
Whatever they do, Amazon serves a useful purpose in the logictics of bringing buyers and sellers together, I don't want to see that broken, but I also don't want Amazon to be the only seller.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by helel on Saturday July 03 2021, @04:17PM (2 children)
This is what we call the "boomer trolly problem." We can stop the trolly at any time but doing so would be unfair to everyone the trolly has already killed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @07:55PM
The actual Boomer trolley problem is that we can't stop the trolley because it's unfair to the trolley.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by fakefuck39 on Saturday July 03 2021, @09:52PM
I think it's much simpler than that. The MBAs and scammy lawyers at Amazon are lying on officially-submitted documents with piles and piles of complete bullshit. If the court goes after them for that, they will claim they lied in good faith, because they did not know the FTC has gone after Walmart, because that would require a google search, and google is an Amazon competitor. When using the search engine on Amazon's site for FTC Walmart Investigations, the products listings that come up do not show any lawsuits. They also used multiple bit torrent site search engines, and could not find anything either. Their claims, while provably false, were in good faith.
There are many times that the FTC has gone after Walmart. Making false claims should get all attorneys involved disbarred, Rudy-turtle style.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @11:37PM
> but I also don't want Amazon to be the only seller.
Vote with your wallet. I don't buy anything from Amazon and have no problem finding all the things I want/need through other sellers. eBay is often a first stop, but finding the source of an unusual item is often quite easy, so I go direct. At least half the time I pay less than Amazon, for the same or equal item.
A couple of times I've been surprised when an order came in an Amazon box--turned out that seller was using Amazon for fulfillment, so I mentally knock that seller off my list.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @02:29PM
Complaint coming in 3... 2... 1...
(Score: 2, Insightful) by FuzzyTheBear on Saturday July 03 2021, @02:44PM (1 child)
" ... an open mind " .. yeah .. if you dont see things our way .. get off the chair .. yeah .. what good does this accomplish ?
Well for Amazon way too much. ANY criticism is untolerable and that's why we need her to be where she is.
Big money don't give a rat's behind about fairness and laws and employees . We saw that with Trump , i am not so sure
a deep investigation about Bezos and his lot wouldn't give the same kind of results : criminal indictments.
Amazon is becoming like Trump .. We're ok .. any criticism is a witch hunt , get those who dare criticise fired .. replace them with people
that we have bribed ( see things our way ) and that's it ..
Just lock em up .. forget trials , forget the justice system . just throw the key . If we don't it's going to be a whining festival and they are getting tiresome.
poor rich .. facing criticism for their doings .. boohoo
(Score: 2) by SunTzuWarmaster on Tuesday July 06 2021, @03:20PM
How TF is this modded 'insightful'? We should jail-without-trial people that FuzzyTheBear doesn't like because they... wrote a letter objecting to the appointment of a critic as an overseer of the case against them?
I'm not saying that Amazon Legal or Bezos or whatever is without blame - but let's keep it real - they wrote a letter. Let's tone down the rhetoric a bit. This is not a crime. No one deserves jail. It is, in fact, a letter.
(Score: 5, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Saturday July 03 2021, @03:00PM (12 children)
Burglar Bob feels the same way about the sheriff. When campaigning for office, Sheriff Sam made a lot of comments about cracking down on crime. Bob feels that Sam should recuse himself from any investigations involving Bob.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @03:23PM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fakefuck39 on Saturday July 03 2021, @09:56PM (10 children)
oof, not a great example. in real life, this would turn out more like "Sheriff Sam is the head of a criminal organization and has lied in court every time on the stand, and committed more crime than Bob. He has fraudulently put away many innocent people, and should be in prison, not in court."
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday July 03 2021, @11:13PM (7 children)
Stuff like that happens. Then, there are more mundane perverts and such in sheriff's offices.
Several years ago, we had a sheriff who liked to cruise around in a patrol car in the late evenings. He liked to pull over cars with young women driving alone. Nothing was ever proven about that, but many young women learned to take a brother or male friend with them if they had to be out. Too bad cell phones and dash cams weren't ubiquitous back then as they are today.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 03 2021, @11:47PM (6 children)
Can you hear the dueling banjos in "Deliverance" from your house?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 04 2021, @12:01AM (2 children)
So, uhhhh, which state are you from, where perverts and assorted criminals don't live? Or, just tell me which state you are from where elected and appointed officials are beyond reproach? Illinois, maybe?
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 04 2021, @01:15AM (1 child)
Runaway is next-door neighbors with a Duggar or two. [littlethings.com]
Some stats.
States ranked by numbers of sex-criminals: [worldatlas.com]
24 Arkansas 10,709
But when we consider Per Capita [allongeorgia.com]:
2 Arkansas 536/100,000
Only Oregon is higher!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 04 2021, @03:52AM
On the question of corruption by public officials, here's one promising site--
https://web.law.columbia.edu/capi-map [columbia.edu]
The summary for AR comes up:
> Despite the ethics reforms passed in 2014, including the creation of a unique Independent Citizens Commission with responsibility for setting the salaries of high-level public officers, Arkansas continues to experience corruption scandals. The Arkansas Ethics Commission enforces ethics and disclosure laws for the executive and legislative branches. Last updated June 2018.
Compare to CA:
> California has a robust oversight system, including the statewide Fair Political Practices Commission, and tends to do well in surveys about corruption risks. Moreover, numerous cities in California have substantive ethics commissions with significant powers. California does not have many Inspectors General, however, which would benefit the Golden State. Last updated June 2018.
Here is a different slice of the data--
https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2020/02/19/the-most-corrupt-states-in-america-infographic [forbes.com]
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Sunday July 04 2021, @02:48AM (2 children)
Yes, yes I can. So can you.
give it a go - type in your address here to hear those sweet banjos:
https://www.nsopw.gov [nsopw.gov]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 04 2021, @03:34AM (1 child)
Nope, my state is one of the ~10 states that don't provide this information to the feds (shown in red in the dropdown list of states).
(Score: 2) by fakefuck39 on Sunday July 04 2021, @09:25AM
well, then just google your state's.
here's chicago
https://isp.maps.arcgis.com/apps/LocalPerspective/index.html?appid=49d3c90a83794684a4af3b6e22e8f7dd [arcgis.com]
banjos everywhere. of course some, or most of these, are bullshit. like adult guy and adult girl both get wasted and fuck, but now he's on the registry and she's a victim. you know, because she can't consent. he can't consent either, but strangely the da refuses to press charges against her.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 04 2021, @12:45AM (1 child)
>retard take
>fakefuck39
like clockwork
(Score: 0, Troll) by fakefuck39 on Sunday July 04 2021, @09:31AM
is clockwork like when your daily alarm rings and it's time to take the pills for your autism?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Revek on Saturday July 03 2021, @04:09PM
Anytime these corporate types want someone in government gone you know they aren't taking the bribe.
This page was generated by a Swarm of Roaming Elephants
(Score: 2) by srobert on Saturday July 03 2021, @04:30PM
I just had this mental image of Bezos screaming at the sky Captain Kirk style.
But seriously, it shouldn't be too difficult for a company as resourceful as Amazon to have Khan replaced at the FTC with someone more to their liking. I would say they could arrange for the replacement of any government official, whether elected or appointed, in most any country in the world given just a little time. The only thing that could stand in their way would be one of the other world dominating monopolies, like Google or Microsoft. And they probably don't like Khan very much either.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Thexalon on Saturday July 03 2021, @06:02PM
Sorry Amazon, but that is not her job. She's a regulator. Her job is to enforce the regulations to the best of her ability. If you believe her decisions are not legally justified, you are free to put them before a court of law, where she will be working on the side of the a prosecutor. She is in no way supposed to be on your team or the team of any other major corporation, she's supposed to be on the team of We The People.
And that means that when you come to her telling her that she should have an "open mind" (meaning, let you get away with stuff that's against the law, and you know it), she is making the correct call when she tells you to fuck off.
"Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 03 2021, @07:00PM
In other news, Benny "light fingers" Steels demands that Sheriff Andy Taylor be fired and replaced with Roscoe P. Coltrane for "reasons".