Originally published at http://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/04/20/just-12-super-rich-donors-spent-34-billion-sway-us-elections-2009-study
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"Just 12 Super-Rich Donors Spent $3.4 Billion to Sway US Elections Since 2009: Study"
I don’t care what anyone says, this “is” criminal.
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Old as organized crime Pony - you just buy the police and the pols.
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Yet, CD castigates anybody questioning LOTE-ing THEIR thugs in and constantly ratcheting us further into Autocracy? GIBBERISH! As Debbie testified, THEIR’s is a kleptocratic corporate duopoly* DNC “beat the Socialist,” so nothing, fundamentally, will CHANGE!
*Unreported poison pills in S/HR-1 worsen this & kill 3rd parties!
~https://www.propublica.org/article/natural-gas-is-getting-cheaper-thousands-are-paying-more-to-heat-their-homes-anyway
~https://jalopnik.com/the-corruption-behind-americas-highway-system-explaine-1846720681 (draft whites & incarcerate Blacks)
~https://theconversation.com/competition-heats-up-in-the-melting-arctic-and-the-us-isnt-prepared-to-counter-russia-149341
~https://jacobinmag.com/2021/04/billionaires-elite-philanthropy-charity-wealth-soft-power/
~https://doctors4covidethics.medium.com/press-release-doctors-and-scientists-accuse-medical-regulator-of-downplaying-covid-19-vaccine-d2431d5abdab
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I keep saying that nothing about our politics will change for the better as long as this is allowed to go on. Until we can get laws changed to prohibit corporate and large donations to politicians, the only question that really matters to any candidate for any office is: “Where are you getting your money?” If the answer to that question is anything other than small-dollar individual donations, they are not worthy of your vote. I don’t care if every candidate for that office is taking big money, do not vote for any of them. It has to be made unacceptable to continue doing this.
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A constitutional amendment and the Fool the People Act are not only an exercise in futility, they could actually make the problem worse.
The problem with big money corrupting our political process is that the big money legislators only pass legislation designed to primarily benefit the big money interests with a few crumbs for ordinary citizens to make it appear palatable.
The big money interests have no interest in getting the big money out of politics because they are benefiting from the way things are now.
So in order to pass legislation to get the big money out of politics you have to first replace the big money legislators with small donor legislators.
The problem has to be solved before legislation to solve the problem can be passed.
There was a representative from Move to Amend on the Jimmy Dore Show recently that said “I don’t know if there is any way that we can get something through Congress ever until we get rid of all of them.”
As for the constitutional amendment that is a good thing as the amendment proposed on their website (like all the proposed amendments) will actually do the opposite of what they claim making the situation worse by taking away important rights that protect small donors, states that organizations such as Move to Amend have no rights under the Constitution and gives Congress the power to control contributions to and spending of such organizations.
Citizens need to demand small donor candidates and enforce that demand with their votes and contributions.
Basic democracy.
Do not make those small contributions to candidates that also take big money.
Do not vote for candidates that take big money.
Do not buy into promises of future action with future legislation that will not get passed until after the problem is solved.
Demand that candidates take action now before the 2022 election by running small donor only campaigns in 2022 (no more than 200 dollars from any one donor per election- 200 primary, 200 general) to earn our votes with action now instead of getting our votes for nothing with empty promises of future action.
Ralph Nader has often said politicians want our votes more than the big money contributions.
Citizens should let people like Ralph Nader and Jimmy Dore know that they want them to organize citizens to make this demand of candidates and enforce it with their votes putting pressure on candidates to choose between taking big money and getting our votes to test Ralph’s theory.
The future legislation approach has not worked for decades and it is time to try another approach that even those promoting the future legislation approach have admitted in their own words is not the path to success.
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Your comment came up while I was typing mine in. We seem to be saying the same thing about not voting for candidates that take big money.
And if there are no small donor candidates on the primary or general election ballot for an office, most citizens can enforce their small donor candidate demand with their vote by casting a write-in vote to create and demonstrate demand for small donor candidates in subsequent elections.
As little as 10% national participation in 2022 could build a base for 2024 that would inspire more citizens to participate in 2024 to get participation up to 20-25% in 2024 which could inspire many candidates to run small donor campaigns to get those votes and contributions.
The problem did not happen in one election cycle and it can’t be solved in one election cycle (barring a miracle).
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“The time is now to get big money out of politics, and move to the public funding of elections, …” …
Heard that once too often, everybody knows it but nothing happens. Would be long overdue to publicly fund elections: Same money and chances for everybody, no undue influence of the (mega-)rich and their corporations … In it‘s current state the US is nothing but an oligarchy
And this in large parts thanks to 2010’s moronic and/or corrupt Citizens United decision. Alas though, the floodgates had already been opened with Buckley v Valeo in the 70s.
Today’s Supreme Court is even worse than the one of 2010. Even if the legislature by some miracle would try to get money out of politics again, there are always the terrible money = free speech precedents former Supreme Courts have set and the 6:3 hyperconservative abomination we have now will happily follow them.
It’s a complete shame, democracy can’t function as long as candidates are mainly beholden to their donors …
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These guys are not that bright. According to the Democrats the Russians won the election for Trump the first go around by spending 100000$
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And that is only the 3.4 billion that we know about.
In truth, money has always been the ultimate determinate in American politics. No man of modest means has ever been POTUS without the backing of a wealthy benefactor. It’s because that, unlike civics class falsely proclaims, we are not a democratic republic. We are a capitalist republic.
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Yep, thank you! Each and every ad dollar, PR release rip & read on Disney-AT&T-Fox-Viacom-Comcast, every 72 point headline cage-rattling echo-chamber agitprop trope is paid for by we the peons: every penny spent on Amazon, at Walmart, each & every time our piss-poor impulse control, silly inebriate grandiosity or unresolved childhood trauma sends up to PayPal, we’ve just voted for the very worst, dead-eyed, inbred sociopaths on earth. “Replublic,” my ass!
~https://thecounter.org/meatpacking-workers-vaccinations-industry-covid-19-crisis-tyson/
~https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-rescinds-outdoor-coronavirus-mask-requirement-2021-04-18/
~https://www.dailyposter.com/p/bidens-inaction-moves-health-care
~https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/climate-change/549254-carbon-emissions-are-soaring-at-historic-rate
~https://mfr.osf.io/render?url=https://osf.io/a9jdq/?direct%26mode=render%26action=download%26mode=render
Why are the rich so damn fixated on keeping America in a state eternal wealth inequality, so much so that they’re willing to spend billions of dollars trying to ensure it remains that way! Could the problem really be mental issues, antisocial personality disorders, as in sociopaths and psychopaths? You know, power and greed. And if so, do we really want these people controlling the country?
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Yep, elections are clearly influenced by money from “within,” not that bullshit Russia influence or any other influence.
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Why would it matter, what we “want, think or need?” That’s media’s job: like telling us what our fears, opinions, candidates & pending nightmarish distraction is, today? It’s worked great for the last few hundred years, at lleast? Status quo, now, means EXPONENTIAL wealth disparity. Forking lemmings to constantly feeding sharks, went to front end loaders. With COVID it’s going to be blowing the cliff out beneath our feet? We’ve seen it everywhere, here: they’re “pulling up the ladder” for their children! The 10% mutated into 2% far faster than new COVID strains terrified (now, uninsured 1099) essential workers. Two weeks ago, EVERYONE here in Manhattan obsequiously wore TWO masks, now ~25-30% of our yuppies go maskless, like Israel? “Doubting science” just took a 180° since Dr Maddow & Dr Cooper told them, Plague OVER, everything’s back to NORMAL! Where’s my BRUNCH, uppity “essential?” Cough, sniff!
~https://heisenbergreport.com/2021/04/20/2-is-the-new-10/
~https://www.mintpressnews.com/bellingcat-intelligence-agencies-launders-talking-points-media/276603/
~https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2020/03/23/the-coming-war-on-china%e2%80%8a-%e2%80%8awatch-john-pilgers-powerfully-relevant-documentary/
~https://theconversation.com/competition-heats-up-in-the-melting-arctic-and-the-us-isnt-prepared-to-counter-russia-149341
More, more, more. Greed, greed, greed. Shortsighted, stupid and selfish like so often in history.
They‘re too much in their greedy selfish bubble to realise that them paying a few billion more taxes would help them in the end too. What good is a fortune if the social fabric has completely unraveled … (Or the country has gone bankrupt …)
The time we live in is getting more and more reminiscent of the 1920s (before everything came crashing down) - Let‘s just hope after the inevitable crash we finally get some policies in the ilk of the new deal again.
(P. S.: In the end, I don‘t get it either though. What‘s the difference between 10 million or billion? Both is enough for many lifetimes. But alas, these people live in a different universe and won‘t wake up until it‘s too late … If even)
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“Robber Barons”
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“I make the joke that in America, you can change political parties, but you can’t the policies. In China, you cannot change parties, but you can change the policies.” - Eric Li, from the Pilger documentary, “The Coming War on China”.
Ain’t that the truth!
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Makes me kinda sick. Right when Reagan’s Miracle destroyed my hometown and took “our future” from us, I’d befriended and shot video for a crazy Hui professor, who’d betrayed her physician parents “for bourgeois tendencies” during the great cultural revolution (her dad was fucking around). Right up until Tiananmen Square, we’d hang out with lots of the PRC “visiting scholars,” while all my US friends were going through: eviction, AIDS, crack, dumpster diving, hopeless debt, joblessness, suicides, gun violence… the Chinese students did not seem disappointed or surprised in the least? They’d ALL known far more about our REAL history, than my exceedingly overeducated friends. She’d only just been told about HIV, by her mom, on the way to the plane. They’d worshipped the guy who’d started our Nuclear submarine force, since it meant we’d never have to fight an unwinnable war. Seems SO long ago, now? Yep, I’m scared.
“Our government can’t be responsive to all Americans if our elected officials are beholden to the elite donor class.”
Our government?
Sorry, duplicate post?