They are overwhelmingly white, rich, older and male, in a nation that is being remade by the young, by women, and by black and brown voters. Across a sprawling country, they reside in an archipelago of wealth, exclusive neighborhoods dotting a handful of cities and towns. And in an economy that has minted billionaires in a dizzying array of industries, most made their fortunes in just two: finance and energy.
Now they are deploying their vast wealth in the political arena, providing almost half of all the seed money raised to support Democratic and Republican presidential candidates. Just 158 families, along with companies they own or control, contributed $176 million in the first phase of the campaign, a New York Times investigation found. Not since before Watergate have so few people and businesses provided so much early money in a campaign, most of it through channels legalized by the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision five years ago.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:21PM
Democracy FTW!!
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:23PM
And the opposite of it is: "Never was so much owed by so many to so few".
I owe, i owe, so they know they got me by the b*lls.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:27PM
if they want plutocracy, we should send them to pluto
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Hyperturtle on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:57PM
God bless the USA; we have the best democracy that money can buy!
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:15PM
One dollar one vote.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:20PM
I'm given to understand that the estimates of return on investment is that a vote for a specific candidate in a specific race runs between $50 and $1000 depending on the underlying likability of the candidate.
Totally unsuccessful minor candidates can get more votes per dollar, but those economies start to fall apart when general popularity is aimed for.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:08PM
There are no black people running as a Democrat. No brown people. All rich white old dudes on the democrat side. Oh, wait - all rich white old dudes, except for one rich white old dude's old lady. Which minority segments of the population are they representing, again?
I guess it's alright though. They tossed a token black into the mix eight years ago, so they can get back to business as usual this election year.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Rickter on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:33PM
And if the old rich dude could run, he probably would.
(Score: 1) by UncleSlacky on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:57PM
Bill could run again, there's nothing to stop someone who's served two terms consecutively from running again at a later date (i.e. taking a break for at least one term, Putin-style).
(Score: 3, Informative) by captain normal on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:40PM
Not true.
Amendment XXII (Amendment 22 - Presidential Tenure)
1: No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:55PM
It is possible that instead of being judged as a racist would, by skin color alone, that politicians should be judged on their stances and records on given subjects.
What are the stances of the most of the GOP candidates regarding minorities and illegal aliens?
What are the stances of the DEM candidates in regards to these same issues?
Are the candidates of hispanic, black, indian, etc descent particularly "good" on the issues that minorities and illegals face?
It is not in fact all about skin color... Unless you're a racist of course.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:00PM
I agree. If you're happy on the plantation, then no one should force you off the plantation. Those rich white people who run the DNC have you right where they want you.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:03PM
Your grasp of logic is astounding...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:59PM
> It is not in fact all about skin color... Unless you're a racist of course.
Look, another variation on the "I don't see color" defense of racism.
You wouldn't expect a congress full of people who have never been to college to adequately value the role of institutions of higher learning in this country, would you?
While it is certainly possible for rich old white guys to understand the life experience of poor brown people. The chances of that happening approaches zero.
It is impractical to expect that people without direct personal experience of the lives of any group are able to fully represent those groups.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @07:55PM
So it is impossible to judge anyone by their actions. Instead you must judge them by their skin color?
That seems like the most non-racist thing I've ever heard.
Congrats!
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @09:28PM
All rich white old dudes on the democrat side
This stupidity is very easy to check.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Bernie.Sanders+net.worth [google.com]
Not even a millionaire.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Martin.O'Malley+net.worth [google.com]
"No reliable estimate available"
Forbes says We pegged Democratic hopeful Martin O'Malley's net worth at $0 [google.com]
Lawrence Lessig [google.com]
No numbers available, but he's a teacher so judge accordingly.
2016 Presidential Candidates, Ranked By Wealth [thrillist.com]
Don't you ever get tired of being wrong?
-- gewg_
(Score: 3, Interesting) by WillAdams on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:37PM
Easiest solution --- all donations must be in the form of hand-written personal checks, which are a small multiple of the current minimum wage in the locality of the person writing the check (say no more than 4 times).
Each such check must be delivered in person, or individually in a single mailed envelope, and accompanied by a letter noting the concerns of the person making the donation.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mhajicek on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:17PM
And you'll get that passed how?
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1) by WillAdams on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:43PM
Put it forward as a Constitutional amendment?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Immerman on Tuesday October 13 2015, @10:06PM
Unfortunately there's only two ways to do that:
1) Get it proposed and passed by Congress so that it can be put to the states for ratification. Which would require 2/3 of both Houses to vote in favor of it. Not likely when the problem we're trying to solve is that the vast majority of both have a vested interest in continuing the status quo.
2) Have at least 2/3 of the state legislatures convene a Congressional Convention and pass a proposed amendment so that it can then be put to the states for ratification
#2 *might* work, but either way you're going to have to convince a majority of state legislators in each of at least 38 states that they should vote in favor of ratifying such a change to the federal election financing laws. Unfortunately when I look around at most state legislators I suspect that they would consider such campaign finance restrictions at a federal level to set a very bad precedent for their own state-level campaigns. Not to mention the fact that the interests who have so corrupted federal-level elections have their fingers deep in the state legislatures as well, and are likely to bring serious pressure to bear against ratification, or even having such a convention in the first place..
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday October 14 2015, @12:36AM
If we're honest we all know that the only way any real change to the US electoral will happen is at the barrel of a gun.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday October 14 2015, @03:28PM
Unlikely. If you can't convince enough people to back honest candidates in a peaceful vote, then you're unlikely to be able to convince enough people to take part in a violent rebellion to make it viable.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday October 14 2015, @11:54PM
I'm not sure those two things are related.
You're right, armed rebellion is very unlikely under the present circumstances, but if it gets to the point where people have nothing to lose, there'll be trouble.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 15 2015, @11:48PM
People always have something left to lose - they just need to lose everything they had slowly enough that they acclimate to the new normal. Barely enough food to eat and a one-room house barely big enough for everyone to sleep on the floor used to be normal, still is in many places. Even literal slaves stand to lose their lives and what freedom from hunger and pain that they currently possess.
Basically, if you want to rely on "nothing left to lose" to turn things around then you'd better hope that the elites get impatient and careless. Because if you truly have nothing left to lose, then you also have nothing left to fight with.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Friday October 16 2015, @12:20AM
If that's the case there haven't been any revolutions in the world then?
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday October 16 2015, @02:37PM
Certainly there have been, but they haven't been driven by people who have nothing left to lose. In fact the driving force behind most of them has been schisms among the "aristocracy", one side of which was willing to make limited common cause with the rabble to overthrow their opposition. Even those with a genuine populist origin are typically born of frustration and idealism, and fought by people who have a great deal to lose, but are willing to risk doing so in order to win something greater.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by SanityCheck on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:44PM
And you'll get that passed how?
Same way as everyone else, he will pay to get it passed.
(Score: 2) by unzombied on Wednesday October 14 2015, @12:04AM
Or, as happened with the Equal Rights Amendment [wikipedia.org] 33 years ago, by public demand.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Wednesday October 14 2015, @12:51AM
You mean the one that failed and petered out?
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:21PM
What happens when they don't donate the money and simply run a commercial of their own?
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:41PM
They are put in jail?
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:15PM
But corporations are people too, and have the right of free speech!
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:24PM
> But corporations are people too, and have the right of free speech!
But not the risk of jail.
Even the people running corps don't go to jail - they just get the corp to pay a b̶r̶i̶b̶e̶ fine on their behalf.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:21PM
Or, if you contribute... It has to be divided up evenly to all running for office, and equal air time.
(Score: 3, Touché) by SanityCheck on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:45PM
So all we have to do is not give them our money and we don't have to see those stupid ads ever again? I like where this is going...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:14PM
The first amendment allows no limits to be placed on speech. Your suggested limitations on donations is a violation of the first amendment, at least until Citizens United gets overturned.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday October 13 2015, @10:09PM
Bull. There's plenty of limits on Free Speech. You can't shout "Fire" in a crowded theater without legal consequences. Nor commit libel or slander. There's absolutely no reason we couldn't add political coercion to that list as well.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday October 14 2015, @01:15AM
So you plan to place Maureen Dowd, Paul Krugman, Bob Woodward, Anderson Cooper, Bill OReilly and Rachel Maddow in prison too? I'd almost make that trade but nah, I'll keep the 1st Amendment and let everybody say what they wanna say, including people that piss you off.
You do realize every one of the people I mentioned are spewing overtly partisan political messages right up to election day, don't you? What rule do you propose that exempts them from your limitation on Free Speech? Or are you even bright enough to have thought that far ahead about the consequences of making laws based on your feelz? By Satan's infected nutsack, I hope you don't actually vote!
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday October 14 2015, @03:26PM
I might be content with a law that made it a criminal offense to make any fraudulent (aka provably false) claims in mass-media. Period - no matter whether it was a political endorsement or an appliance ad. Put in some reasonable limits for required due-diligence and you've managed to simultaneously deal a serious blow to lying politicians, blow-hard media personalities, and fraudulent advertisers. And no loopholes for prefacing a provably false statement with "in my opinion" or other such weasel words. Opinion does not extend to factual claims.
Piss me off all you like - but you're not allowed to lie while doing so.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @12:51PM
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:21PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exnaY0l4XsM [youtube.com]
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 5, Interesting) by RamiK on Tuesday October 13 2015, @01:43PM
There's about 500 families telling 315 million people what to do nowadays. In 1776, seven founding fathers signed the deceleration of independence supported by the power of 20-30 influential families at least.
So, the representation factor went from 1:80k to 1:600k.
Even if you take more favorable figures, the colonies broke off from the crown for much less.
compiling...
(Score: 5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:21PM
the deceleration of independence
Best.Typo.Ever.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:47PM
I thought it was the "then" you meant ... except perhaps this time it will be "10 times worse then 2016".
(Score: 3, Funny) by RamiK on Tuesday October 13 2015, @09:45PM
I regret nothing.
compiling...
(Score: 3, Informative) by Hyperturtle on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:25PM
Also consider that there were 13 states then, now we have 50.
The representation as divided across the 50 states instead of just the 13 yields an uglier number.
The average representation factor (using your numbers as the source) would be .000625 per person with the representatives we had at the 13 colonies (taking the 50 states and dividing it by 80k) 7 people plus 30 wealthy land owners does stretch the numbers out; this isn't too strange considering the US Senate has 2 state representatives, per state, regardless of population. The numbers today are far worse in that regard, but all states are on equal footing (Congress being another matter). At least we sort of vote for those people, even if they are funded by the problems we are discussing.
With our approximate representation factor at 1:600k as you've noted, is now .000083 per state. That means those 500 families are 99.999917 more influential than you or I, on average. Not quite six sigma, but impressive nonetheless. They will more reliably vote for their interests than various online services are expected to be up and responsive.
Perhaps that is why many of the masses are faceless and voiceless. It is hard to tell the rabble apart from other rabble. To keep them distracted, maybe the powers-that-be can reboot a google drive or two and watch the little people scurry! I bet they laugh about how many of them even gave up the only copies of rights they had and that they are powerless to stop the erosion further--the new OS takes up more local space and you have to be a 1% member to buy the high end model!
*of course my math could be terribly wrong, someone feel free to correct me and my theories...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:30PM
I disagree. I'm a college student, who, after tuition is deducted, is living off of a mcdonalds wage. By being careful with my money, I have managed to purchase a higher end phone with 64 GiB of storage.
Let's face it. The rich are rich because they own credit card companies and sheep pay using credit. I only use cash, checks, and debit. Less money goes a lot further when you have less interest to pay.
Anyone can afford a higher end phone. Use energy efficient devices, get a $40 internet, $100 utilities, forget TV, avoid eating out. Tada, extra money. :)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by SanityCheck on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:01PM
What you describe requires: thinking, planning, and self control to follow said plan. All are in short supply in the vast population. (Trigger warning: sweeping generalization) Most people cannot think critically (or at all). Or they think with their emotions, meaning they just do what they feel. Hell, even I am guilty of both once in a while, but by and large I am the person who does the least of both out of everyone I know personally.
Yes if everyone was as astute as you (or to some degree me), the problem would fix itself. But the real problem is: the reality is much different. Maybe the people have the best government they deserve, but that is too pessimistic a view even for me. The world is set up to take advantage of the average person (through various means of maximizing profit, or jsut outright theft through deception), realizing that this is the case is necessary to championing any change. Making other people realize this is also necessary. When you walk down the street and you see some fool getting hassled in three-card Monte should make you get angry at the person taking advantage of the fool. This situation is not that that different.
Still it is refreshing that not all college students are a waste of skin, and water, and can think and act like informed consumers, conservatives tend to forget that. And of course not everyone in dire financial situation is there of their own making, conservatives tend to miss this one by a mile.
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:07PM
I thought anyone not in college through the funding of well-connected elite parents are not deserving of federal aid?
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:25PM
Depends on who you asked. For example college thinks those individuals not being financed by their parents are not deserving of "scholarship" money. The college banks on the needy students getting federal/state aid since their parents can't afford tuition, so they only give "scholarships" to upper-middle class students to entice them into coming to their school. Yes they justify it with one of the ethical theories I'm sure.
Now what others think about funding education, like why it makes sense to spend more money in Iraq than could have been used to give everyone free college education [huffingtonpost.com], is beyond my ability to address.
(I don't really read the Huffington Post, but they do bring up the college education where as other publications with similar articles said nothing about it).
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:28PM
Does $40 innernet get you faciebook and tweeter? Cos i gootta have facieboik and twister... oooh, shiny!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:01PM
Cutting out Cable / Satellite alone saves $60+ a month. That translates to $720+ a year. Cutting out monthly bills really starts to add up and give you a bit more spare cash. Though, now I have a baby, so most of that "extra cash" isn't extra anymore.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1) by WillAdams on Wednesday October 14 2015, @01:51PM
Yep, credit cards are the company store for the 21st century.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:33PM
From: http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/ [ucsc.edu]
Q: So, who does rule America?
A: The owners and managers of large income-producing properties; i.e., the owners of corporations, banks, other financial institutions, and agri-businesses. [Which are comprised of about 200,000 US families.] But they have plenty of help from the managers and experts they hire. You can read the essential details of the argument on this site, or read the new seventh edition of Who Rules America?.
Q: Do the same people rule at the local level that rule at the federal level?
A: No, not quite. The local level is dominated by the land owners and businesses that own downtown real estate and big shopping malls. They come together as growth coalitions, which turn cities into "growth machines" when they gain control of local government. Everything is about land values for them, and that requires office buildings, stadiums, museums, concert halls, shoppers, conventions, and tourists.
Q: Do they rule secretly from behind the scenes, as a conspiracy?
A: No, conspiracy theories are all wrong for many reasons. It's true that some corporate leaders lie and steal, and that some government officials — including the President — initiate secret actions and then try (and usually fail) to keep them out of the newspapers. But those activities are not what is meant by a conspiracy theory, most of which involve an imagined small group of people secretly plotting to gain or retain control of the government through illegal means.
Q: Then how do they rule?
A: That's a complicated story, but the short answer is through lobbying, open and direct involvement in general policy planning on the big issues, participation (in large part through campaign donations) in political campaigns and elections, and through appointments to key decision-making positions in government.
Q: Are you saying that elections don't matter?
A: No, but they usually matter a lot less than they could, and a lot less in America than they do in other industrialized democracies. That's because of the nature of the electoral rules and the unique history of the South.
Q: Does social science research have anything useful to say about making progressive social change more effective?
A: Yes, it does, but few if any people pay much attention to that research.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:06PM
Its a weird form of wealth tax. An extortion racket, basically. Its just not run by IRS accountants, that's all.
You can have very weird conversations with populists and democracy LARPers along the lines of the USA already having a modest progressive nationwide wealth tax its just the money all goes to ad agencies and TV broadcasters not directly to the treasury. Indirectly a "large fraction" of the donations get captured by the IRS just one hop away; this makes the effective revenue of the "election tax" lower than you'd think, but hardly zero.
There is the broken window fallacy that wasting labor and capital money on selecting one of two pre-selected morons to do the bidding of those who hired them regardless of who wins is a waste compared to spending the money on something else; the fact of the matter is we need $X million of bread and circuses so even that doesn't apply.
As a culture jamming strategy, "the 99%" should troll the 0.000001% into donating more money by answering every single poll as "i donno yet". It might be the only way the economy will ever get significant money out of those greedy bastards.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by nitehawk214 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:23PM
It's not socialism if the money does not go to help anyone that actually matters. It is a bureaucracy, where the media is part of the system and needs their palms greased if you want a hope of winning a national election.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:56PM
I guess it all depends on how you define who actually matters. With the exception of a few donors, its a wealth transfer from megarich to small(er) businessmen, more or less. On the theory that anything not too immoral or unethical that reduces income and wealth inequality is inherently good for a society, the result should be net improvement. On the other hand if "people who matter" is defined narrow enough then I agree under that additional criteria it would be pretty much useless.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by nitehawk214 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:49PM
Except it is more like a transfer to the "Political Ruling Class", who then enact taxes and laws that direct public funds into the hands of the megarich. In the end the bureaucracy exists only to serve itself and results in more money sucked out of the rest of us.
Much like the Orwell's "Everyone is equal... but some are more equal than others."
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:20PM
I don't think we disagree although we're obviously looking from different directions and scales.
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday October 14 2015, @04:38PM
That is for sure.
Usually I am of the mind "don't complain unless you have a solution to fix it"... but this time, I really have nothing.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:30PM
> Its a weird form of wealth tax. An extortion racket, basically.
That's only true if you posit that the results are inevitable - that democracy is a sham and that we are an oligarchy as much as europe was under the rule of kings, princes, viscounts, etc. Inevitably someone will make a flip comment that democracy really is a sham. But that's an analysis that focus on the failures rather than the successes.
(Score: 5, Informative) by curunir_wolf on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:16PM
...in a nation that is being remade by the young, by women, and by black and brown voters.
Yea, not so much. Yes, demographics in the US is changing, becoming less while and less male. But... not so much "the young". The baby boomer generation is still the most populous one, and a lot more of them vote. Even after Obama brought in many new young (and black) voters in 2008, participation of registered voters under 35 was an anemic 46% (and that's out of only 62% of eligible voters that were actually registered). Compare that to the turnout for the 55 and older crowd which was closer to 70%. And that was 2008. It's even worse for minorities. Turnout by Hispanics and Asians was just above 30% int 2012. Black voters did better, turning out 60%, but that's still below the white participation rate over 65%.
So, no. Hispanic do not show up to vote, and only about 60% are even registered. Black voters do better, but their registration numbers AND participation numbers still fall below whites. About the only accurate part of that sentence was about women. Women are more likely to register and more likely to vote. The young, the black, the brown voters would rather sit at home and let whites and women pick the candidates.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @02:51PM
Fairly certain it has been a LONG time since the nation was "made" by the votes of the people.
This seems to reference the fact that many more women, young people, and minorities are providing the work/innovation/productivity that is actually making the modern United States as opposed to the united states of the 50s,60s,70s.
The government continues to lag behind the people for all sorts of reasons, not least of which is complete legislative capture by moneyed interests.
(Score: 2) by curunir_wolf on Tuesday October 13 2015, @10:39PM
This seems to reference the fact that many more women, young people, and minorities are providing the work/innovation/productivity that is actually making the modern United States as opposed to the united states of the 50s,60s,70s.
I started to take it that way too, except they specifically said "the young, by women, and by black and brown voters." I agree that it's a major overstatement to say the nation is being remade by any "voters" at all, but to apply it to those groups (except women), is even more off-base.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 5, Insightful) by VLM on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:04PM
The young, the black, the brown voters would rather sit at home and let whites and women pick the candidates.
Technically the way it works is the rich guys help pick the nominees, then whoever gets nominated (probably their choice) has their loyalty purchased, then let the women or minorities or whites or whatever (doesn't matter) select which of the two 1%er owned properties they want to represent them, then the winner does what the does what his owner tells him to do.
Observationally you can see this in the behavior of Obama basically being the 3rd and 4th Bush term. The speeches would have sounded a little different but in terms of what actually gets done, who gets bombed, etc, nothing changes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:40PM
> Technically the way it works is the rich guys help pick the nominees,
You are referring to the theory of the "Invisible Primary." Turns out it isn't so clearcut. [vox.com]
> Observationally you can see this in the behavior of Obama basically being the 3rd and 4th Bush term
That's a reductive analysis that ignores the fact the government is three branches with millions of people, gigatons of inertia and a high coefficient of friction. For example, BushCo put at least as much effort into starting the Iraq invasion as Obama put into getting Obamacare implemented. Set in motion and running for many years those sorts of things are essentially impossible to undo.
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Wednesday October 14 2015, @05:21PM
I think that if it were a mandatory holiday for voting the turn out for lower age voters might possibly be better. Having to make sure your rent is paid vs voting might be a deciding factor. Specially if your boss doesn't accept you being late or leaving early to make the poll times.
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 2) by curunir_wolf on Wednesday October 14 2015, @09:33PM
I think that if it were a mandatory holiday for voting the turn out for lower age voters might possibly be better. Having to make sure your rent is paid vs voting might be a deciding factor. Specially if your boss doesn't accept you being late or leaving early to make the poll times.
That's typically just an excuse. Most states have polls open for 13 hours on election day (are there any states will less time?). I know they are in my state - I'm an election officer. It's a 15 - 16 hour day doing that. And requirements for using an absentee ballot have been significantly liberalized in the last few elections - if you're working a shift that means you can't make it to the polls, you can always vote absentee.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Thursday October 15 2015, @02:32PM
I understand and agree. But picture this. A single mom bread winner for the family has to work her job and be home to take care of the kids (couldn't make/wouldn't have) time to go to the polls. This is just an example. I think that it would increase voter turn out was all I was saying.
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday October 13 2015, @03:43PM
In recent days I have grown concerned about what will happen if Bernie Sanders actually wins the election. Mind you I am a staunch supporter but my concern is that he adamantly criticizes the wealth elite.
Those people have a lot of cash. That kind of cash can buy a lot of power, if it doesn't buy them the election, if Bernie does win they'll have the power some other way.
I'd really like to see Bernie win but I fear the backlash from the rich.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:47PM
Nah, they don't care. If anything, they'd be pleased because it would continue the fiction for the rabble that elections matter for a few more years. But they're not really worried, because they own Congress, most of the important state houses, some of the significant localities like NYC, and the top leadership of the bureaucratic departments that matter like the SEC and the Treasury. One President does not trump all that.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @07:31PM
One President does not trump all that. I see what you did there !
(Score: 2, Insightful) by linkdude64 on Wednesday October 14 2015, @01:55AM
My favorite detail about Sanders vs. Trump (among many others) is that while Trump says "_I_ will make America great again" Bernie says, "_We_ must make America great again." He has stressed that, very elegantly, in every aspect of his campaign, from funding to policies. He stresses that citizen involvement is the only way to enact real change. Corrupt Congress or not, if he becomes President his ideals will be given legitimacy on a global scale. I daydream that he would catch the nations interest and have talks like the "Fireside Chats" about the state of Congress, foreign policy, etc. He is getting the snowball rolling.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday October 15 2015, @03:58AM
There is very little that I admire about Reagan but I have to agree with “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things.”
I want to do something about global warming; while I COULD drive a car, I choose to ride public transit, as well as to live in a city where public transit is abundant.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Wednesday October 14 2015, @05:23PM
I was actually seeing the backlash as a positive. It might get the population aware of the underlying issues that the bread and circuses allow them to ignore.
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:05PM
None of them made the list.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:43PM
Probably because they have a ton of obfuscation in their money flow - lots of cut-out "foundations" with little to no public reporting requirements that take money from multiple donors, run it through an anonymizing mixmaster, and then pass it on to the candidates and their superpacs.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:43PM
Which will we have first, President Koch Industries or President Monsanto? Since corporations are people, right?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @04:44PM
Investment
(Score: 4, Insightful) by jmorris on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:12PM
They are overwhelmingly white, rich, older and male, in a nation that is being remade by the young, by women, and by black and brown voters.
That line actually describes reality better than the author of it probably intended. Allow me to introduce some crimethink realtalk and stir things up a bit.
The nation is being remade as described. The problem is this 'ascendant' demographic is mostly of use for one thing, voting. And the one thing they can be counted on to agree and vote for is the idea that they are 'entitled' to the wealth generated and accumulated by the white, rich, older and male. What they have done or will do to 'deserve' this wealth is left unstated because to even ask the question in those terms is considered outside the pale of polite political debate. Discuss. (if you dare.)
(Score: 4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 13 2015, @05:54PM
you are a tired old broken record
if hipsters didn't love vinyl, no one would even listen to you
(Score: 2) by etherscythe on Tuesday October 13 2015, @06:16PM
Alright, I know the shiny globe being dangled here is attached to an anglerfish. I'll still bite.
Humanity is deserving of a bit of respect. In the sense of having a safety net, yes, constituents are deserving of having a little government assistance to fall back on during hard times (this was, after all, almost the same theory as the bailout offered to banks and auto manufacturers not long ago). The focus, naturally, needs to be on returning to productivity and self-sufficiency, but there's no reason we shouldn't want to keep the lower classes from being so desperate that they have the motivation to break into peoples' houses and take anything not nailed down, and applying some cash to give them something to lose wouldn't be the worst idea we've had as a nation.
I say this as someone who was outraged not a month ago to see food stamps being used to purchase an impressive shopping cart full of soda and junk food for a family of which one was grossly obese and driving a scooter cart. The assistance programs need reform, but they are there for good reasons.
"Fake News: anything reported outside of my own personally chosen echo chamber"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 13 2015, @09:19PM
I'm not a FTFY guy, but FTFY.
OK, I'll bite. I dunno, they harvest the food you eat, build your home, watch your children, cook your restaurant meals, drive the trucks that bring your blithe purchases to your door, clean out your sewers, pick up your garbage, and a great many other jobs you're too proud to do, the jobs you're too good to do. Every one of those occupations brings more value to the world than every Wall Street banker combined, who produce nothing and help no one. Yet, all those occupations combined are paid less money than any one given Wall Street banker. Why is that?
All these rich, old white men you identify with ought to be sent to live as indigent immigrants in China or some such place, travelling by shipping container with barely enough food, water, and oxygen to survive, then spat upon by haughty Han who call them waigui and complain endlessly about their filthy beards, sickly pale skin, and body odor. It seems nothing less could give them the perspective they so desperately lack.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Tuesday October 13 2015, @11:55PM
they are 'entitled' to the wealth extracted and accumulated by the white, rich, older and male.
The assertion that the wealth of the rich was wrongly taken from the poor is an unsubstantiated and counter-factual assertion, despite being an article of faith by progs. Bill Gates did some shady crap but people lined up to buy his substandard crap, he didn't 'take' anything from anybody, certainly not the poor. You could argue he screwed over a lot of other rich people starting with IBM and Digital Research but the poor? Or take Zuckerberg; a lot of us did our best Admiral Ackbar impersonation to no avail as people lined to to give him every personal detail for him to become rich converting into targeted advertising. But he 'took' nothing. I could continue but instead I want to hear you explain how the rich get rich taking from the have-nots.
I dunno, they harvest the food you eat, build your home,....
Pardon me, but they are PAID for those jobs. Nobody objects to people working and being paid for it... except for socialists so you are barking up the wrong tree. If you don't think they are paid 'enough' then I simply retort, "Who gives a crap what you think?" That is the whole point of the invisible hand, it requires no 'superior man' to decide who 'deserves' what, they get what the traffic will bear, not a copper more nor one less. Many can pick produce, few can play in the NBA; one of these professions pays more. Some people can actually make money on Wall Street, many more think they can and lose. That is why the winners make a lot.
Now we don't have a pure Capitalist system, your kind has tainted the system with fascism/corporatism and I'd like it excised. Problem is you want to protect the parts I want to eliminate.
All these rich, old white men you identify with ought...
Spoken like every fascist in every time and place. There are always Kulaks to be liquidated, some disfavored minority to scapegoat and disposses so the Party's favored can divide the loot. FYDITM is all the reponse required.
But you know (but won't admit) that if you took a thousand millionaires and a thousand welfare clients, all between 30-50, and tossed them naked on an island with the proviso they couldn't build boats and leave; then came back in a decade you would find basically the same order reestablished. A few Trustifarians would be quietly buried, a few of the former losers would have seized the initiative and come out on top in the rebooting of a society but most would be pretty much where they were before. And that Truth burns, drives all of your kind's insane rejection of all objective reality in an attempt to convince yourself that it ain't so. It can't be so because you would have to admit the fact you aren't a winner isn't society's fault, it ain't the 'System' keeping you down, it is you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 14 2015, @07:43AM
There are always Kulaks to be liquidated,
Oh! Goody! I just love liquid Kulaks! Will there be enough for everyone, or should I bring some Jagermeister just in case?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday October 14 2015, @09:42PM
Tongzhi, you do not get to have it both ways. You do not get to wave your hand and erase infinitely high, scientifically gathered piles of data because you simply don't like the conclusions, and then turn around and demand factually-substantiated assertions. We already all have abundant proof that you are immune to facts. You go and search out the evidence that Americans' real incomes have declined over 40 years while their productivity has soared and the incomes of the 1% have also soared. The entire rest of humanity does not need a US News & World Report survey to know this, because they live it every day. You do not get to have it both ways.
Yes, of course, because serfs have such compelling negotiating power, eh? Let's do strip you of everything and drop you in, say, Zanzibar and see how well you fare. No, you don't get to Phone a Friend, and you do not get to go to the Embassy.
Yes, poor, poor old rich white men. So beaten down, so under-represented in the power structure. Truly they are the minority, and they too must wear their colors and represent.
Your poor-me-ism disgraces every old white man who ever built anything with the strength of his own right arm. I am a white guy. Me and mine come from a long, long line of white guys who fought and worked their guts out to build a better life. You do not get to appropriate who we are with your whiney sense of entitlement.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday October 13 2015, @09:59PM
158 families still believing in politicians in 2015 is pretty impressive, if you ask me.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by redneckmother on Wednesday October 14 2015, @02:50AM
I appreciate your sentiment, but I think the key word here is not "believe" but "control".
Or perhaps, "own".
Mas cerveza por favor.