Comment by FridayoLeary
3 days ago
The sentiment i picked up from HN is that she was more of an activist leader with a grudge against big corporations and that this clouded her judgement. The cases she bought were insubstantial and fell apart. She's a bad poster child for what the FTC should be.
To me, a good regulator should be losing big cases.
If they aren't, it means they're not pushing the boundaries of their authority hard enough.
I don't know, but that isn't what i'm talking about. She pursued weak cases, and overstepped her authority. she should have spent more time constructing a better case, or not bringing them in the first place. As it was she accomplished less then she hoped and wasted everyones time and cost the taxpayer money.
> she should have spent more time constructing a better case, or not bringing them in the first place.
I disagree.
As to the former, the case is what the case is: obviously everyone would like to construct the strongest possible case.
As to the latter, the joke about career prosecutors only bringing cases they know they can win to pad their record comes to mind. In a regulatory role, IMHO prosecutors should be as aggressive as the law allows them to be, especially against the largest companies. It's difficult to claim that Google can't afford to mount a vigorous defense for itself.