Like everyone else, I watched the movie of the week, that clandestine video from Mitt Romney's fundraiser in Florida. I thought, we now have a record of what our modern day, wealthy gentry really thinks about the rest of us, and it's not pretty.
On the other hand, it's also not news. If you had reported as long as some of us have on winner-take-all politics and the unenlightened assumptions of the moneyed class, you wouldn't find the remarks of Romney and his pals all that exceptional. The resentment, disdain and contempt with which they privately view those beneath them are an old story.
The video, in fact, called to mind our first Gilded Age, back in the late 19th century when the celebrated New York dandy of the time, Frederick Townsend Martin, summed up the era when he declared, "We are the rich; we own America; we got it, God knows how, but we intend to keep it."
And so they do, as that glitzy gathering in Florida reminds us. You could see and hear one of the guests ask Mitt Romney:
AUDIENCE MEMBER: But what do we do? Just tell us what we can help....
MITT ROMNEY: Frankly, what I need you to do is to raise millions of dollars, because the president's going to have about $800 to $900 million. And that's -- that's by far the most important thing you could do.
The governor's being truthful there, because as we heard from Trevor Potter, money rules these campaigns. If there were more secret videos from other candidates, we would see them in equally compromised positions -- bowing and scraping in their infernal pursuit of campaign cash, bending over backwards to suffer the advice that the privileged think their money entitles them.
And I do mean both parties. Not far from this studio the other night, at a Manhattan fundraiser hosted by Jay-Z and Beyoncé, President Obama joked, "If somebody here has a $10 million check -- I can't solicit it from you, but feel free to use it wisely." At least, I think he was joking. Obama and Romney alike now shape their schedules as much around moneymaking events as rallies and town halls. They'll change the campaign jet's flight plan and make a special landing just for the cold, hard cash.
This, folks, is a racket, plain and simple. All that spending by the parties, corporations, super PACs and other outside groups will push political ad spending up this year by half a billion dollars, 25 percent higher than 2010. The biggest increase in history. That prompted the CEO of CBS, Leslie Moonves, to lick his chops and tell investors last December, "There's going to be a lot of money spent. I'm not saying that's the best thing for America, but it's not a bad thing for the CBS Corporation."
So we journalists can't stop reporting on this, even though we're often told, "Please. Change the subject. Everyone's tired of this one." I'm not so sure. Trevor Potter sees a groundswell for rooting the money out of politics, as Americans come to see that this is the one reform that enables other reforms. And two polls released in the last few days report large majorities, as many as eight in ten of you, are in favor of clamping down on the amount of money that corporations, the super-rich and those shadowy outside groups are pouring into the campaigns. It's up to all of us to put a sign on every lawn and stoop in the land: "Our democracy is not for sale."
That's why next week we'll investigate yet another way in which corporate forces and their political allies are flying underneath the public's radar, with the help of a front group that goes by the innocent-sounding name, ALEC.
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Ericka Andersen: Twitter Promoted Trends: Taking Political Advertising to the Next Level
As usual!
One can't help but remember the words of justice of the Supreme Court, Louis Brandeis, who wrote in 1897, "we may have a democracy or we may have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both."
Please keep it up, as your work raises the level of our political discourse in this country. You do a great job of pointing out the purveyors of the most insidious of lies, the 'half-truths' that so many hide behind while boldly proclaiming them to be facts.
Thank you sir!
This would give an uber rich person 435 votes, 1 for member of the House and Senate. And a vote for each state legislative member. Somebody please tell me that this illegal!
Three options to take back control by We, the People:
o MASSIVE and PEACEFUL movement like civil rights
o Second PEACEFUL revolution like Serbia's overthrow of Slobodan Milošević, led by Otpor
o Second "blood and bullets" revolution
The first reform after regaining control must be publicly financed campaigns with NO contributions from:
o corporations
o unions
o PACs and SuperPACs
o professional lobbyists
o tax-exempt organizations
o individuals
The cost would be far cheaper than rebuilding the country after a second revolution.
"This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them."
— Frederick Douglass, 1857
or we can have great wealth
concentrated in the hands of a few,
but we can’t have both."Justice Louis D. Brandeis
I feel sorry for the eyeballs and eardrums of the voters in any contested district or swing state. The flood of baby-eating DemocRAT ads leading up to the election is going to be painful. Not yet sure about anti-Obama ads. If Romney's campaign is dead enough, the SuperPAC money may be directed towards such black holes as Michele Bachmann...
The wealthy only get one vote each, regardless of their donations, but the amount of wealth they throw at politicians will determine how their strongly and effectively their speech determines the recipient's actions while in office, and you can bet your first million it won't be to benefit any of the 99% of America.
I'm sure that this is not a universally accepted position. However, it is the truth!
What is interesting, are his is comments regarding the Romney video, nothing ever changes.
Greed conquers all. Here, we literally have people who are addicted to wealth even when
they know that that this addiction has the potenial to kill them and theirs. Look at Bernie, he's really not much different than the entire banking community except he stole from some very rich people.
We haven't seen the end of bad bankers. The are addicted and their addiction will eventually be their undoing.
Romney and many like him aren't bankers but they are criminals with a wealth addiction. Every corporate "takeover" is a fraud (felony). The money to execute the take over is borrowed in bad faith using as few of the Corporation's assests as possible for collateral. More money is borrowed, assets are sold off, and the takeover Executives pay themselves huge salaries and bonuses, and then fire themselves. The shell of the corporation is left for Chapter 11 and the lawyers, and the workers and stock holders are out of luck. There are hundreds of variations, but the scam never changes. What is amazing is the tollerance shown these people. In the gambling world, you skim a nickle and you're a deadman.
No one has a answer, but, "it was the best of times and worst of times" might be a good lead in.
I understand the increasing need for all forms of escapism during this mess, but we seriously need to rouse this sleeping monster as it's beginning to rot from the inside out and stew on its own fetid dung heap.