Not just national but local. Bill Foster has $994,000 raised so far in his bid to get back to congress. Judy Biggert has $1.2 million raised in order to stay there.
Obana strategist David Axelrod told an audience at Benedictine University, "Frankly, my biggest concern is this proliferation of money in politics." He noted that political action committees are poised to spend $750 million through the November elections.
Bill Mego in a recent column, talks of voting machine trustworthiness and an effort to get Naperville on board with amending the Constitution so only natural citizens and not "associations of citizens," i.e. companies, have First Amendment rights.
Agree? Disagree? What should we do? What can we do?
Is money too big a factor in politics?
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We are a democratoc repulic with a constitution, so the only way to fix it is NOT to limit spending by Unions (the top echelon of contributors), corps, or individuals.
The answer is much simpler ---- term limits for everyone.
With many politicians working to undermine the working class, encouraging job cuts, impeding equal pay for equal work, openly supporting efforts to cut benefits for the poor, infirmed, and elderly in order to reduce spending during a major recession, I find the amount of money being pumped into political campaigns nothing less than outrageous.
These examples show that money is too big a factor in politics. When many of our representatives are serving the wants of financial supporters rather than serving the needs of the people they are charged to serve, it is obvious money has corrupted their politics, and corrupted any sense of fairness and decency they might have for the less financially powerful in our country, states, and communities.
Considering close to $1,000,000,000 (that's a billion dollars) was reportedly raised by the two presidential campaigns last month alone, just imagine all the money spent to support ALL politicians and political campaigns over the years, including winners and losers, from national campaigns, all the way down to the local campaigns. Let's add the money spent by named and unnamed persons/corporations to promote their political candidates, or political interests. Let's throw in all the money spent on lobbying efforts by special interests too! What if all that money could help reduce the national debt, and help fund needed programs for the American people instead of being frittered away on the politics of it all?
YES!!! There's too much money in American politics. It's particularly offensive when the money is spent to disseminate self-serving political propaganda intended to mislead the American voting public with lies and deceptions to win at any cost. On top of the paid advertisements we see during campaigns, we are bombarded with much of the same kinds of propaganda unfettered through media mouthpieces on the airwaves and cables almost daily. There has to be a better way. I believe money could be better spent to more directly support the financial security of our country, and the American people.
Agreed, especially since he was fighting tens of millions of union and national Dem money PLUS 50,000 ground troops working against him, and he still won!
Before any knee-jerk responses, please A) do the research as no Dem talking points welcome, and B) remember in your research they spent millions and millions to run a primary (they spent $5 million on the primary loser) and to initiate the recall itself.
Interestingly, today's WSJ points out that most of Walker's money came from individuals (legal in Wisconsin), while most the opposition came from groups (as expected, Citizen's United favors those with union support).
;)
Ask Scott Walker. I bet his answer would be a resounding "no."
I agree, only non-profit corporations, unions and large Marxist leaning Trusts like the the Ford Foundation should have any say in how we run the US.
Move-on is a PAC, but they share the Great Leaders enlightened vision of remaking Amerika into a society where each produces according to their abilities and each consumes according to their needs with the Central Planning apparatus reallocating the resources justly. So only PACs sharing the Great Leaders Vision can contribute money to elections.
All others are either mentally ill or recidivist Bourgeois and need to be re-educated to the realities of a truly equal and just society. We will start with their children in the schools and educate them in true social and economic equality.
Yeah!
Right on!
Stop all corporations! End them all now! Better dead then corporate led! End the oppression of ciizen's united! Oh, the inhumanity of it all!!!!
Oh, wait ---- than there would be no jobs, no money, no products, no food, no roads, no infrastructure, no gas/oil/energy, Then what? Well, no civilization.
But that's all right: we would have Southeast Side's socialist utopia!
We could all go back to the stoneage and starve, but Southeast and his ilk will be happy because we will all starve together, as one, kumbaya, in unison.
The 100%!
Victory for the moron class!
Anon wrote:
- I hope your definition also then means that UNIONS cannot contribute also because they are also a collection of people on the opposite side of the fence as the corporations
I agree!! Corporations are all abount maximizing PROFITS for their ownership, and to hell with everyone else, society, the environment, etc. And we agree that UNIONS are the opposite! Thanks to unions, we have employer-paid benefits, safe working conditions, and a 40 hour work week. Before Unions, people worked 12 hour days 6 days a week in unsafe working conditions and there were NO benefits. What a horrible country we would be without unions - slaving away at the whim of the each boss.
May 1st is International Workers Day, so it is great that you brought this up!!!
I also agree that when we have TRUE campaign reform and contribution limits are lowered enough to not let the rich folks BUY elections and politicians, then unions should not be able to contibute either - Heck, they wouldn't need to!! A limit of about $5 is probably as much as someone on Minimum wage could afford. So when contribution limits of $5 are enacted, it would mean everyone has EQUALITY in choosing politicians. I really look forward to it.
Usually the anonymous trolls that post here are right-wing nutbags - You are clearly a friend to working Americans!
Linda - I hope your definition also then means that UNIONS cannot contribute also because they are also a collection of people on the opposite side of the fence as the corporations.
I don't care who or what contributes to anyone, or how much they contribute, as long as it is tramsparent and posted on the intenet within 24 hours of either receiving the cash or depositing the check.
ONLY individuals (or spouses) may contribute money to a political fund for re-election. All monies contributed MUST be used for that specific purpose - with accountability - and for no other purpose i.e., simply not retained by the campaign fund committee. If the money is not used, then return it to the donor.
NO companies or associtions of any kind may contribute funds.
Let's get back to fair play in our elections. This issue is too important to ignore any longer.