The Federal Trade Commission has requested some 223 Million Dollars in their FY 2007 budget despite their piss poor previous performance to protect the public. Luckily the President of the United States did not give them all that money, but he did provide them with sufficient monies to carry on. What some may not realize is that the Federal Trade Commission has not done so well in curbing crime, preventing monopolies or helping the consumer in fact if you look closely at their endeavors from 1999 to the present you can see they have actually hurt consumers in my opinion, helped criminals and attacked businesses which would have provided more choice to consumers, lower prices and more competition in the market place. Indeed this is one agency that should get the complete budget axe. Why you ask? Well first let us consider their efforts to fight SPAM. SPAM saw a constant increase and rose sharply during their so-called enforcement period. In fact many Spammers were embolden by the fact that the FTCs own PR showed that there was little if anything they could do. In one letter to Congress the FTC said a Do Not SPAM List would actually give spammers a free e-mail directory to work from. That is probably true, however it shows their weakness and inability to cope with the real problems in cyber space and also shows their complete disregard for their own strengths to curb SPAM. Only in Washington DC can you screw up so bad and get paid more the next year for it? Go figure FTC. Consider this in 2006. |
