The mob is angry. The pitchforks are raised. But are they pointed at the right people? Have they knee jerked a moronic Tea Party into power, only to see the same damn crap that made them angry in the first place? Are the the moronic masses being duped by a charlatan who promises them he will make it all right? Are we all not frustrated with the power of money and how it influences policy?
The populace seems not to quite understand what type of democracy we live in. There is this perception that "majority rules, damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead. We voted that way, and that's the way it should be....to hell with the constitution!" This ignorance was also exhibited in the primaries by both parties, so a quick little lesson is in need. Quite a long and large lesson may be more appropriate, by the looks of things lately, and I would go so far as to say, one of our presidential candidates is in great need of one, but we neither have the time nor space to regurgitate a complete course on High School Civics.
We live in a Representative Democracy, as opposed to a Direct Democracy, or a nation of plebiscites. Realizing that we are essentially idiots, our Founding Fathers brought forth a system in which we elect political elites to make most of the decisions for us. Those people among us, whom we believe, or have convinced us, that they are wise and willing to make those decisions ably. Certainly, the wisdom part, and ability to make good decisions has become quite debatable many times throughout our history, but especially so now.
Additionally, we operate in what is defined as a Pluralistic Democracy. This is a system in which it is emphasized the essential role performed by groups, as intermediaries between the public and the elites….those that we elected. These Interest Groups are especially important for transmitting the wishes of the citizenry to government officials in between elections.
The idea is that the decisions made by our representatives are the result of bargaining and debate and compromise among the various groups.
This method gives us, members of the public, time to actually make a living, feed our families, and recreate, instead of spending all of our time being actively involved on a daily basis lobbying our elected officials ourselves. We are able to voice our concerns via interest groups. (Unless you are a political blogger, then you spend all your time on other people’s blogs, news sites, watching the news, reading the paper/news web-sites, researching to make sure your facts are straight, getting distracted by Face Book, and finally getting to bed at 2:00AM).
I know I used the word, "Elite" above, in describing whom we elect. Any abhorrence to that word, is simply proof of your lack of thinking this through. When you need knee surgery, do you want a carpenter messing around with your ACL? Professional politicians were our Founding Fathers...almost each, and every one of them. I wouldn't trust my neighbor to make laws that I have to live by, any more than I would trust him to do surgery on me...especially since he is a sales guy.
The lack of understanding on this does amaze me. Even in the primaries, most people don’t understand how it works. I kept wanting to play the commercial with the little old ladies taking photos off the wall to unfriend each other and the smart one says, “That’s not how this works! That not how any of this works!”
A tweet from @rolldigity after the U.K. recommendation vote for BREXIT, says it all :
“Gotta hand it to stupid people. They may not understand nuance, secondary effects, or the long term, but damnit! They sure know how to vote.”
This is all to say very simply, on a national level, we elect our representatives, of which, special interest groups, such as AARP, The Nature Conservancy, NRA, AMA, and other, numerous associations, trade organizations, and even corporations, gain access to those representatives via direct lobbying, or lobbying firms. The intention is that they are there to gain access to our representatives through numerous methods and speak on our behalf.
Currently, there are 9,918 registered lobbyists in Washington DC. Add to that every lobbyist on each state level, and you see that there are a shit-load of lobbyists.
So we must now ask ourselves, does this system work? Do we feeble people, working daily to put bread on the table, earn enough to fix the car, or even buy a new one, scratching out time to play with our kids, read a book, learn a new language; do we see our representatives working on our behalf to make things bearable, if not even better? I think we can all jump up out of our seats right now, and shout in unison a resounding NO!!!!!!!
But where did we go wrong? Whys is the system broken? How did we screw this up so badly? One word……..MONEY!!!!!!!!!
The day we decided that money was a form of free speech, instead of property, is the day this system went straight to shit!
(Jack Abramoff, Infamous Lobbyist, that threw money around like it was candy)
Since the topic in recent news is the debate of guns, gun ownership, and gun control, I am going to use the NRA and gun rights advocates as an example in trying to explain why we need not only campaign finance reform, but an overhaul of how money influences politics. Take an in depth gander at www.OpenSecrets.org for a rabbit hole of information on money in politics, and where it comes from.
In 1994, Congress passed the Assault Weapons Ban and was signed by Bill Clinton. That ban expired in 2004. Why couldn’t Congress get this extended? Why hasn’t a single gun control law been passed since then? Because, when we have a group that is loaded for bear, and with a seemingly limitless amount of cash, we create a situation in which the lobby manipulates the populace, rather than speaking on it’s behalf. We can see a correlation in that, in 1990, over 80% of American wanted stricter gun laws. Since then, Gun lobbyist groups have given more than $37 million to candidates and spent $48 million in marketing, action committees, etc… By 2012, less than half of the population felt the way they did in 1990. In that same time period, gun control groups have only spent $2.5 million on politicians and outside spending.
Over $1 million has been been contributed to Republican Presidential Candidates so far this election by the NRA. It has been shown that when a candidate receives a significant contribution from a special interest group, they vote for the interest of that group. For example; in 2013, the Manchin-Toomey amendment requiring background checks in all commercial gun sales, including gun shows, failed by six votes. Almost all of the 46 Senators that voted against it, had accepted significant contributions from gun rights special interest groups, including the NRA. No matter your feelings on gun control vs. gun rights, you must agree that money has very much to do with how legislation turns out.
It isn’t just with gun rights groups. Hell, they aren’t even in the top 10 of contributors to our politicians. The top spenders on lobbying since 1998 (in order) are, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Realtors, American Medical Association, Pharma Research & Manufacturers of America, and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. In 2016 so far, those groups have spent over $54 million. There is more to come, because in In 2015, special interest groups spent $3.2 BILLION!
The Pharma lobby is just as notorious as the gun rights lobby, if not more so. in 2015 alone, the industry spent almost $152 million on lobbying efforts. Of course there is little effort to curb the rising costs of our drugs.
Lobbyists and special interest groups are important for our Democracy to work, to give us that voice. But each voice needs to be on equal footing, with equal access, or at least not separated by billions of dollars to the point that lobbying groups are capable of swaying public opinion. They are OUR voice, not the other way around.
