When Political Parties Represent only Corporations

[icehorse]

Once again, I’m on about the Oligarchy, perhaps our most urgent problem. This article is more about corporate control of politics, but to me this is a very, very short step to oligarchical control of politics. If you think this is a dangerous conflation, I welcome your perspective.

That said, this seems like a very nicely stated article. One - perhaps less obvious point - that stands out to me, is that this corruption is causing appropriate and great distrust from the people. So perhaps one reason that we ended up with trump is that some people were so desperate that they’d vote for damn near anyone who might break free of Washington. (Of course trump is an even worse lapdog of the oligarchy)

To me the key point is to make this idea extremely well known to the population. As it is, those in power have done a fantastic job of setting us against each other, and distracting us with far, far less important issues.

Who Represents Us When Our Political Parties Represent Only Corporations?

 

[Twilight Hue]

Once again, I’m on about the Oligarchy, perhaps our most urgent problem. This article is more about corporate control of politics, but to me this is a very, very short step to oligarchical control of politics. If you think this is a dangerous conflation, I welcome your perspective.

That said, this seems like a very nicely stated article. One - perhaps less obvious point - that stands out to me, is that this corruption is causing appropriate and great distrust from the people. So perhaps one reason that we ended up with trump is that some people were so desperate that they’d vote for damn near anyone who might break free of Washington. (Of course trump is an even worse lapdog of the oligarchy)

To me the key point is to make this idea extremely well known to the population. As it is, those in power have done a fantastic job of setting us against each other, and distracting us with far, far less important issues.

Who Represents Us When Our Political Parties Represent Only Corporations?

Name any political party in the entire world that doesn't deal with capitalism.

 

[Revoltingest]

Name any political party in the entire world that doesn't deal with capitalism.

I considered offering examples of parties doing things for people,
but then I realized that every example could somehow be seen
as benefiting corporations, eg, prison reform, gay marriage.

 

[Loviatar]

It seems to me that there's a difference between "dealing with capitalism" and the current, post-Citizens United system America has of unlimited campaign donations by corporations and unlimited ad-buys by SuperPACs funded through secretive donations. For examples of its effects, one need only look at candidates bending over backwards in the Wall Street funding sweepstakes, and the recent dangerous EPA-gutting under Scott Pruitt.

It seems pretty clear that this system does make oligarchy worse, and that this legitimate threat to the average citizen's degree of say in government is bound to embolden increasingly further left movements. You're already seeing heavy polarization, which includes within it increased lurch leftward by the Democrats and a growing far-left paralleling the rising far-right. Machiavelli and de Tocqueville both saw excess oligarchy as one of many threats to a stable republic, and I believe they were right.

It would be better, I'd think, to allow smaller private donations and ad-buys but re-impose the previously existing restrictions on unfettered buying of politicians, especially on money from centrally controlled non-person entities like a corporation or union. Anything less seems less like a democratic republic, more like a legitimized bribeocracy.

 

[sun rise]

The article is to me pretty accurate. There was a study in California some years back about how many laws passed by the Democratic majority were written by special interests and for special interests.

The biggest issue I have with the article is that he stops with a description of the problem. And to me he minimizes the difference between bad and worse. Because solutions can either be gradual, choosing less bad over time, or dramatic and sudden.

History has shown that, with a very few exceptions, revolutions end badly with the new system being even worse than the old one.

What I'd love to see is people becoming less tribal and more focused on who benefits from the actions of law makers. And to kick out of office those who are the biggest toadies to the special interests even if they purport to be on our side.

 

[PureX]

Once again, I’m on about the Oligarchy, perhaps our most urgent problem. This article is more about corporate control of politics, but to me this is a very, very short step to oligarchical control of politics. If you think this is a dangerous conflation, I welcome your perspective.

That said, this seems like a very nicely stated article. One - perhaps less obvious point - that stands out to me, is that this corruption is causing appropriate and great distrust from the people. So perhaps one reason that we ended up with trump is that some people were so desperate that they’d vote for damn near anyone who might break free of Washington. (Of course trump is an even worse lapdog of the oligarchy)

To me the key point is to make this idea extremely well known to the population. As it is, those in power have done a fantastic job of setting us against each other, and distracting us with far, far less important issues.

Who Represents Us When Our Political Parties Represent Only Corporations?

It's way worse than their just representing corporations. They are for sale to the highest bribe-payer. That means they are also for sale to OTHE NATIONS. (Like Israel, which uses some of the massive amount of aid money that we give them to bribe our own legislators to give them even more, and they do.) Or like the Russian banks giving Trump hundreds of millions of dollars when all the other banks on the planet realized that Trump was a financial loser, and refused to loan him any more money.

The way it works in the U.S. legislature, now, (and apparently even in the presidency,) is that anyone with enough money can pay a professional lobbyist to write whatever legislation they want to see passed, and the lobbyist (often a retired legislator) writes it for them and pays a bunch of congressmen and senators to pass it. And they do, usually without even reading it. It's not just corporations that can do this, it's anyone with a lot of money. And they can buy any law they want, or pay to eliminate any laws they don't like. It's total corruption and the people are not being represented at all, in any of it. They are being systematically robbed by the very politicians that are supposed to be representing their interests. And yet we keep electing and re-electing these whores and thieves to positions of power, year after year after year.

So I guess we LIKE being robbed, lied to, cheated, and treated like crap.

 

[Estro Felino]

Well...to begin with , we have anti-Freemasonry laws, and by contract the members of the executive power must not be Freemasons.
This tries to fight hidden collusion with Corporations and corruption.



Btw ...it turns out that Trump has declared war on a family that wants to keep the control over the FED
President Trump To Reclaim Federal Reserve From Rothschild Family

 

[BSM1]

I considered offering examples of parties doing things for people,
but then I realized that every example could somehow be seen
as benefiting corporations, eg, prison reform, gay marriage.

Straw reform..oh, wait..