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Is This What Plutocracy Looks Like?
Must Be The Money
- GOP Declares National Victory in Wisconsin--The Nation
Scott Walker's win doesn't necessarily mean Mitt Romney will triumph in November. But it does prove that corporate money threatens American democracy. - Wisconsin recall shows labor isn't coming back. So what's next?- The Washington Post
". . . But if you take labor's decline as a given, then another question presents itself: How do you limit the resulting corporate power over elections and legislators?"
Buying Elections
There is nothing more frustrating to see a lot of hard work go for naught. The workers of Wisconsin had that experience when despite their efforts, Gov Scott Walker won retention.
To start with, I cannot help to think that the "Tea Party", and it's "%1" backers will have Walker make the public employee unions pay some price for their insolence. I could see "Right To Work" legislation coming to that State's legislature.
And one can see why. They likely played a big part in Walker staying in office, and Wisconsin may be a glimpse into what American elections may look like in a post Citizens United world. With corporations the same rights as citizens, save to be held criminally accountable, they will be able to spend unlimited amounts of money to advance their agenda. The type of grassroots action that brought people like the late Paul Wellstone into office may be a thing of the past. The "%1" need merely purchase as much advertising as they want.
But can this election also be a rallying point. Unions are not the only group of people that could see their power wane in the age of the "SuperPac"; women, Hispanics, homosexuals, etc, all could see their voices silenced by the "%1".
Could the solution be a "Fair Election" movement, based on getting the corporate genie that the Supreme Court unleashed at least under control? Something along the lines of the DISCLOSE Act, requiring groups to make lists of donors available would likely have broad support, except among those who fear what would happen if people knew who were being bankrolled by.
Of course this has a problem all its own. There are divisons among the opposition, many the result of the tactics of the "%1". Labor and environmental groups have often been at odds. The machismo-driven Hispanic and African-American cultures still may not fully accept the homosexual community. Can the idea that all these groups are fighting a common, corporate, enemy be enough to unite them?
Or is "Occupy" right? Is the system broken beyond repair? If that be the case then the question becomes how to replace this system with a new, more populist one. Maybe it's already too late and "USA Inc" is an inescapable reality, leaving resistance and perhaps (cyber)insurgency as the only options.
Comments
The Koch Brothers have bought our democracy by engineering the Citizens United decision. Their policy writing arm, ALEC, has written state laws that restrict democratic voting. This combined with their unlimited spending is an attempt to take over all of government. They must be stopped. Great Hub.
Before too long, the angry bigoted sheep that follow the Koch brothers and ALEC blindly bleating will be thanking their Benevolent Overlords for allowing them to keep their monogrammed patriotic keepsakes...USA, the Usurped Serfdom of America.
CP
- Author
Chris:
If it comes from Beck, etc and their cable news(?) affilate, they will.
Ignorance is for ever the problem, where do we find conservatism and the tea party to be strongest? In the states with the lowest high school completion rates, Democrats are twice a likely to have a college education, the church enforces it's own backwards ideology on children all over the country intent on keeping them ignorant. Ignorance is the problem but I am not sure how to fix it. Great hub as ever TeaPartyCrasher, voted up and interesting.
Yes, it was a very sad evening, indeed, at the Capitol. The Barrett "victory" party was a block away also.
They bought that election, as you guys are all saying here. Walker's campaign millions were mostly from out of state. Barrett's --- about a tenth of Walker's --- mostly from inside of Wisconsin.
But --- at least the legislature has changed due to the recall campaign.
We're not going anywhere.
Voted up, useful, interesting, funny.
Thanks
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That is an odd combination Hunt.
hahhahehehehohohoho, you guys crack me up! Ok since you don't take the time to study, I am willing to help! 71% of Walkers money came from the great folks of Wisconsin, In the past 24 hours we learn the unions were very close to spending the same amount of money Walker recieved. Koch brothers are peasants compared to what Zoros gives you so why do you keep bringing them up??? Corporations should be able to compete with unions, At least Walker can say he got his money from the people! Unions must first forcefully steal it from members of both political parties and give it only to Democrats! Face it gentlemen, America is sick of unions, liberals and failure!..........you had your chance now sit down, shut up and allow us with true backbone to fix this country!
hey TP sux to be on the losing side doesn't it! LOL, you and I will have a blast come November! I will be chatting it up with you daily!
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You keep letting ALEC and the Koch's sell you their "Corporate State". When you're a serf to them, the "%99" will be glad to help you reclaim America from them.
Check out my hub "The Weekend Class Warrior" to see that I have my plans for a "Romney Regime".
"America" didn't vote in the Wisconsin gubernatorial. Only people in Wisconsin.
Although I have been wondering how many of them were paid to live here for a while only in order to establish residency for voting. The Tea Party and the Koch Brothers and ALEC all knew a long time beforehand exactly when the recall election would happen. It wouldn't be difficult to find, say a few hundred thousand homeless people, to do the job.
TPC: What do you mean by odd combination? You mean the Barrett "victory" party and the sad evening at the Capitol?
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Hunt:
I meant having this voted as "Interesting, useful and funny" (Though not in that order)
Oh, I see. Yes, LOL :-)
Well, humor is always "useful", right?
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