There are two ways in which money has destroyed our democracy and the entire political system. The first is the easiest and most straightforward way- buying politicians who are already in office. When corporations or special interests "donate" to those politicians, there are specific strings attached. Once a corporation buys a politician, they own them. Then they simply direct them on how to vote when it comes to legislative bills. Individual citizens can never hope to raise enough money to buy legislation and compete with the massive and continuous flow of money available to huge corporations.
A corporation is made up of people, but a corporation is not a person. A gang is made up of people, but a gang is not a person. A union, a school, a hospital are all made up of people, but none are or are representative of an individual person. Collectively, any of these groups is obviously larger and more powerful than any one person, but none of these groups' primary purpose is political activism. Corporations provide goods and/or services. Unions represent workers. Schools educate students. Hospitals care for the sick and injured. None of these groups should have an "extra" say in our political system, but especially corporations. The goal of a corporation is to make money. There is nothing wrong with that, until it goes wrong. When corporations do things that hurt the public or the environment or buy politicians in order to enact legislation that helps them be more profitable- that's when things go wrong.
The second way money has destroyed democracy is more complicated, but it involves actual elections. The sickening amount of money spent on attack ads and trying to discourage certain groups from voting and suppressing voter turn-out. One national trend going on right now is individual states trying to suppress the Latino/Hispanic vote by creating laws that require a person prove citizenship before being allowed to vote. While this may discourage illegal immigrants from voting, it also discourages legal immigrants as well. The right has an amazing ability to rile people up and get them motivated enough to get up off their fat asses and vote. They do this by tapping into their base's hatred and bigotry. The people on the right hate Obama so much and are so angry and do not want him to win again so much that I predict they will be showing up in record numbers in the upcoming presidential election, while the people on the left have become so disenchanted and disappointed with Obama, there is no way they will show up in the same numbers they did in 2008. The republicans have dominated the debate no matter what the issue and no matter what it means for the country. They are experts at taking over and twisting an issue to their favor and they are never called out or punished for their tactics, which often involve outright lies. Republicans are admirably united and unwavering in their talking points and stance. Democrats are so weak and so pathetically incapable of fighting back or uniting or taking a stand, they are utterly useless. What bothers me the most is that despite the fact Obama has been more to the right than Bush and Reagan, the republicans have succeeded in convincing a huge portion of the American public that he is a far-left, liberal, progressive, socialist. I am not going to vote for Obama not because he IS any of those things, but because he is not. No, that does not mean I am voting for the alternative, and should my non-Obama vote mean that the other side wins, so be it, but that is not my fault.
And this is how I arrive at wondering what's the point and why should we bother anymore. Even if Obama wins, it's still Obama and Obama is not progressive, not liberal, not even a democrat. There is no candidate who represents me and my values and my views and even if there were, once elected, there is no reason whatsoever to assume they would govern that way. I've written about this before, but I honestly believed in Obama. I believed him and his campaign promises, his promises for the country and to not have "politics as usual," I believed in his message of hope and I felt excited for the future. I'm embarrassed at how naive I was and my cynicism is bordering on turning into complete indifference. I find it very hard to believe there is any way to win back democracy without having the country fall so hard, it leaves no other choice but for the people to take it back, but even then I have my doubts.
Every time I hear about the millions and billions being spent on campaigns and Super PACs, I can't help but think how awesome this country could be if that money was actually spent on something real- like high-speed rail or just improved public transportation, infrastructure, education and research, technology, science, even a fucking awesome theme park, for crying out loud! Anything other than "air space" to spew bullshit. If all those corporations and super rich "donors" reinvested that money into their employees, into improving their products, into the public sector, into making the country better for EVERYONE, this country could be better than ever and a place to be proud of again. If we could get true campaign finance reform and get the money out of politics, corporations and the rich "donors" would save a lot of money or they could choose to spend it elsewhere. It's not as though they would lose as this is not about anti-capitalism. It's just about having a fair and just political system where the individual citizens have the most powerful voice and we decide how the country is run and most importantly, the politicians WE elect, represent US- you know, as in, "We the people..." Remember that?
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