Demos has a new report on income inequality and how the wealthy buy inordinate influence in the political system. For example:
The imbalance is even more pronounced when accounting for contributions to Super PACs. During the 2012 election cycle, Sheldon and Miriam Adelson gave a combined $91.8 million to Super PACs. It would take more than 322,000 average American families donating an equivalent share of their wealth to match the Adelsons’ giving. The Adelsons gave more to shape the 2012 federal elections than all the combined contributions from residents in 12 states: Alaska, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, and West Virginia.
The result is that issues that lower-income Americans think are important, like affordable healthcare and prioritizing jobs over deficit reduction, are ignored in our political system. We’ve heard it all before but this report puts it together in one place and it’s an ugly picture.
Wag
And with all that money all Sheldon got was a lousy single half of Congress
RaflW
Yes, and, as many if us as possible need to keep giving as generously as we can. The response to Adelsons billions cannot be surrender.
We’ve got to support efforts to amend the Constitution to end this shockingly in-plain-sight corruption.
General Stuck
I thought we won the election, in spite of Adelson et al…. wasting large sums of money on pipe dreams. Our media is fucked up and beholden to whatever it is that allows republican scripts to get a better reading, but this past election should be a testament that money can’t buy elections so easily. You need good candidates and a message of inclusion rather than exclusion. And something other than ideas that have failed in practice for governing by the right.
This was good news, and did surprise me some. We even won the overall popular vote for House seats. Therefore, I don’t think it is off the wall to conclude that the public isn’t necessarily listening to the msm, like in the past. And that alternate forms of receiving information had some sway.
RaflW
@Wag: Well, yeah, they sure are lousy.
The GOP rump in the Senate would no doubt be mucking up the sequester and other crap, but that Boner half of Congress is a walking zombie disaster. A different outcome in the House last Nov. would be a very different political landscape today.
WereBear
The contrast between old and young is really stark, here. (I consider myself between those two extremes ) Because people older than me religiously watch “news shows” and people younger than me never do. Well, The Daily Show. Which I consider a radicalizing force, and Colbert is even better; he’s an immunizing force!
General Stuck
And as well, the demogoguery with the debt and deficit didn’t win the day for the republicans. It worked out that voters rightfully see it as valid issue, long term deficit spending, but not the impending doom for us all. Just because Joe Scarface-boro says it on the teevee, does not mean it is believed by the majority in this country. Not anymore.
Elizabelle
@RaflW:
I think the sequester and everything else that happens before 2014 might prove those safe GOP seats are not as safe.
We have to turn this craziness to our advantage.
Wag
@Elizabelle:
This.
aimai
@General Stuck:
The public isn’t listening to the MSM, sure, or the Adelson’s desires, but the issue is that the press and the politicians still are. Even if you aren’t on Pete Peterson’s payroll directly he is shaping the entire conversation about what matters. Even if you are spending 50 percent of your time pushing back that’s 50 percent of your time, as a politician, that you aren’t spending doing something important for your actual constituents. And that, it seems to me, is the most disgusting thing of all: that the Republican party and its billionaire backers have basically constructed the public dialogue about public issues so that pleasing the voters by making their lives easier, by helping them find jobs, by making education cheap or free, by creating free national healthcare is already ruled out of bounds.
becca
I ask this question to a lot of people-
Should one individual be allowed to accrue enough wealth to undermine the sovereignty of nations?
c u n d gulag
@becca: @becca:
HELL NO!!!
Which is why sensible nations have much higher tax rates on their top earners.
They figure, let the rich MFers hire attorneys and CPA’s to look for loop-holes with their spare cash, rather than leave them with piles of it, to try to take the whole system over, for their benefit alone.
Mike in NC
I hope the scumbag Adelsons spend $250M during the 2014 election and it buys them exactly squat.
WereBear
@becca: That’s an excellent question! It will go in the toolbox.
General Stuck
@aimai:
I don’t deny that letting money into the political processes is not a corrupting influence, just that it is not the panacea that the wingnuts had hoped for. Much of the corruption is going to settle in between elections, while the governing process is occurring, and now that the expected other shoe of Citizens United is about to fall of allowing unlimited contributions to candidates, money will flow even more in the direction of special interest.
But the irony is shaping up, that all this cash pumped into elections and donations between those elections, are actually having a more negative effect on the wingnuts. By every measurement, and with changing demographics, the republicans are being pushed into moderating their bullshit, to get elected. But they can’t seem to make those changes, and more money is feeding the illusion they don’t have to, I suspect.
We need to get big money out of elections and governing, but maybe the way to do it is a degree of counterintuitive opening of the cash spigots to get a fuller picture of the corrupting influence of money, so the voters can make their decisions over time.
The good news is, we don’t have to rely on teevee networks and cable news shows to get our information, and more and more people are taking advantage of that, and are throwing away their teevees like I have done for 4 years now. The money will tempt those prone to it in elected positions, but there are a lot more eyes watching them with the power of a mouse click to pass on the news of what they are up to.
aimai
@General Stuck:
Yes, I agree with this. Its why I’m not as depressed as other people are about whether the Republicans take the blame for the sequester or not. First of all: I think they will. SEcond of all, the Obama machine is cranking up and fundraising on this, and organizing on this, already. I know that because I’ve already been contacted. I don’t think the tea party has anything like this on their side because the money guys lost interest and infrastructure after the last election cycle. The NRO isn’t doing any heavy lifting on this–too busy grifting–and outrage shaped at Fox news 30,000 feet isn’t going to function as an organizing principle for political action.
becca
@WereBear: the funny thing is, when I ask the answer has is almost always an immediate “NO!” or the occasional “prolly not”.
thalarctos
There are two possibilities.
Either the dispossessed majority uses its democratic power to change the rules of the economic game and put an end to the gross disparity of wealth,
or the wealthy minority will use its economic power to change the rules of the political game and put an end to democracy. It could be argued that this has already happened. The problem isn’t limited to who gets elected; money corrupts those who have already been elected as well. It’s much more likely that a Senator will return Warren Buffet’s phone call than mine.
Of course, in the long run these things have a way of sorting themselves out. As the saying goes, “Roosevelt today or Robespierre tomorrow”.
VidaLoca
aimai: — do I recall correctly that you live in the Chicago area? When you say ” I know that because I’ve already been contacted.”, does that mean contacted by OfA? Reason I ask is, where I live (Milwaukee) there has not been a peep from them and I’m starting to become curious whether or not they are serious about attempting to re-start and re-organize after pulling up stakes and leaving town on Nov. 7.
Have others heard from OfA? I recall reading something by Kay that said they were active where she lives. Anyone else?
SatanicPanic
After the last election I just can’t get all that upset about the money imbalance anymore. It might actually be to our advantage that the Republican party is being led around by the nose by morons like Adelson.
OzoneR
@Elizabelle:
Thats what we’re trying to do and what the media is trying to prevent.
General Stuck
Presidential shark and the Pinocchio menace.
Sounds like O is trolling congress a tad for going home and not fixing the sequester.
Johnny on the spot twoof teller, Glenn Kessler is having none of it. Knocking down the snark for freedom, or something.
Hence, a president with no more elections to face, let’s his freek flag fly. I love it.
Todd
@becca:
When the revolutionary cadre executes Adelson and the Kochs on live TV, flaying them with bullwhips before dangling them slowly by long ropes, I plan to DVR the event so I can watch it over and over and over….
Todd
@c u n d gulag:
Ding ding ding! We have a winner who got it in one!
Mandalay
@General Stuck:
It may look that way, but what the money from Adelson et al buys is more than just seats in Congress.
It is what causes the Right to suck Netanyahu’s cock at every opportunity. It is what causes Romney to go to Israel to bow before its leader. It is what allows Hagel to be painted as a traitor because he won’t kneel to Israel. It is what causes Sarah Palin to wear a lapel pin with an Israeli flag. It is what causes the US to oppose Palestine’s bid for UN recognition. That garbage does not happen because anyone believes in it, and certainly does not reflect public opinion about Israel.
Money talk$.
General Stuck
@Mandalay:
Dude, step away from the bong.
Go spooftroll somebody else. I ain’t buying your bullshit.
Mnemosyne
@VidaLoca:
I’m in California and I get multiple e-mails a week from OfA, including at least one every week asking me to go to this or that organizing event. Are you on their e-mail list? You would be if you donated any money to the campaign last year.
zimmerman
Money doesn’t talk — it swears.
nellcote
I don’t see how we get rid of big money in campaigns thanks to Citizens United. But I think transparancy/exposure might be do-able and could make a big difference.
dance around in your bones
@Mike in NC:
Totally OT, but I remember my husband getting up at 3am for a fishing trip and asking sleepy me if I had any recipes for squat.
“Squat? sez I – why?”
Husband sez “Because that’s all we’re going to catch”.
Still makes me laugh. Oh, and they caught a lotta squat.
Chris
@becca:
No. Frankly, I kind of consider high tax rates on the rich to be desirable in and of themselves, precisely for that reason. Liberals in the old days worried about the clergy or the military as a threat to democracy. In our era, it’s concentrated wealth. To be honest, in my more radical moments I wonder if there shouldn’t be a maximum wage as well as a minimum one.
nellcote
@General Stuck:
Wish he’d mentioned that Congress wasn’t taking any cuts.
Mandalay
@aimai:
Exactly. Everyone titters at how few seats the billionaires managed to win, and miss the larger point that their money frames debates. The discussions become the extent of US support for Israel when it bombs Iran, or how it is harmful to the economy increase taxes on the rich, or why unemployment benefits must be decreased.
There were a couple of posts yesterday on how “journalists” here were pushing a story about Malaysia for cash. The idea that this would never happen with US politics is very naive.
The Koch brothers may care about how many seats Republicans win, but what they really care about is taxation, and they don’t need seats in Congress to control that.
Chris
@General Stuck:
What I personally got out of the election, besides “money alone can’t buy elections” which of course has always been true, is “presidential elections are too expensive for even the biggest fortunes to buy single handed.” But the same isn’t true of local elections.
Anoniminous
Money is necessary but not sufficient to win elections.
And there is a funding level beyond which throwing additional money into the campaign is futile. Romney spent a total of $6.35 from all sources (IIRC) per vote versus Obama’s $1.83. Of Romney’s total spending Rove’s $500 million bought nothing.
And Americans have become saturated with Top/Down mass media advertising. We turn it off, literally and figuratively.
The answer to the 1% throwing hundreds of millions into campaign war chests to get tens of billions worth of lax (or no) regulation, government contracts, government largess, & etc. is an engaged, active, citizenry working to elect (at least semi-) honest politicians with their heads screwed on straight.
Mr Stagger Lee
@General Stuck: Well out here, on the military base I work at, the civilians had been told in 30 days they will work 4 days instead of 5, for starters, they are pissed, and as a contractor my ass will get nicked too. And they are pissed at congress, one problem though, the districts that the base is located in are represented by Democrats(the living legacy of Norm Dicks D-Military Industrial Complex) so will they take it out on the guys here, two of them first timers. Sure the GOP here would preserve the base, but you know they would do whatever to F— over the civilian side, with cheaper contractors.
Anoniminous
@Mr Stagger Lee:
The two Congresscritters need to be out there holding public meetings, giving interviews on local media, & etc. to get the word out that it is the GOP refusal to pass a minor tax increase on billionaires that is the cause of all this.
MikeJ
@becca:
They seem to think Soros’ (perfectly legit example of free markets at work)attack on the Pound is the worst thing ever in the history of the world but have absolutely no problem with people handing out checks on the floor of the senate.
aimai
@VidaLoca:
No, I did live in Chicago about 17 years ago (wow, time flies) but I live in the northeast now.
Tokyokie
@MikeJ: Although I doubt those wingnuts had much problem with his targeting the currencies of Asian emerging market nations back in the ’90s. Funny dat.
General Stuck
@Chris:
It may be true, but not always at the national level. CU came after Bush, TARP`1, Iraq, torture , Katrina, and all the other failures of the Bush administration. That his administration excesses had only pushed over the edge republican excesses in general, since 1980. Primarily conservative econ philosophy of deregulation, and all the trickle down nonsense that brought on the Great Recession of 2008.
If CU had occurred before that, all that extra money could have given the GOP a bigger and commanding majority to do even more damage before the chickens come home to roost. It probably now is going to keep them lingering with some power in the House of Reps, where they lost the popular vote, but won the gerrymandered seats. I think that gerrymandering and 6 to 1 cash advantage will help them keep the House and seems to be their emerging strategy to the extent they have one, as they are the closest to local elections, where even small amounts of money advantage can still sway voters to them. But not forever, unless they change to meet the demands of the emerging minority power house voting block into the future. The only other alternative is to ditch democracy altogether, which isn’t out of the question for these knuckle draggers.
JoyfulA
@VidaLoca: I’ve had lots of contacts from OfA lately in SC PA, although I was not active in the last campaign (when I was in a full-leg brace) other than a small contribution. I haven’t responded but am active in the local Democratic club.
VidaLoca
@Mnemosyne: @JoyfulA: Thanks to both of you for the feedback. I’m glad to hear that our situation here may be more of a local anomaly than a pattern. While I personally spent a lot of time knocking on doors for Obama and Tammy Baldwin it was not through OfA so I’m not too surprised that I have not been contacted by them myself. Other people that I know, who were quite active in OfA, haven’t heard from them either though.
grandpa john
ppalachian trail walking ex governor.
grandpa john
addendum; Sort of like my Appalachian Trail walking, ex -gov.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@SatanicPanic:
After the last election I just can’t get all that upset about the money imbalance anymore. It might actually be to our advantage that the Republican party is being led around by the nose by morons like Adelson.
Uh-huh. So you think the situation is (You + Democrat Party) vs Republican Party rather than You vs (Democrat Party + Republican Party)?