Forum Post: *** Big Money Out Of Politics***. Who's with me?
Posted 13 years ago on Nov. 5, 2011, 8:10 p.m. EST by happybanker
(766)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired of it. It's one thing just about everyone agrees on. Lets DO something and quit talking about it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KV_Vk9C6EWQ&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Personally, I'd like to see big labor in politics, independently and on its own terms rather than as an appendage of the Democrats. That, would do more to "reform" American politics than any campaign finance nostrum
Up arrow. A Labor Party. I still feel like Campaign Reform would be necessary. I have always thought that Campaign Reform would open up the field for more parties to gain entrance to the political arena. DNC and RNC are BIG money machines because the current political process allows it and makes it nearly impossible for another party to gain entrance. I think that a Labor Party would be entirely possible with and because of Campaign Reform. And, be very helpful!
While it takes all kinds to make a social movement, I feel very strongly that the resistance of OWS to adopt any specific demands it the right course to take and from what I can see is likely to be the continuing course of the NYC GA at least. While I realize that many people disagree with me, personally, of all possible specific demands, the notion of Campaign Finance Reform is one of the worst I can think of. If anything it will do nothing but increase the power of an already too powerful corporate state. The United States already has the most complicated and undemocratic set of elecion laws of any industrialized democracy. Making them still more complicated and giving the corporate state still more power over the electoral process is hardly a move toward the democratization of that process.
RedJazz, everytime I talk to you- you make me put my thinking cap on! By improving our democratic process that has been corrupted by money, improving the representation of all constituents, how does this "increase the power...of the corporate state". I know you have a ready answer for this!! Please tell me, don't leave me hanging!
Generally, the way campaign finance reform is formulated, what it would do is make what is already the most complicated and restrictive set of election laws in the industrialized world still more complicated and restrictive and, what is more it would give the corporate state, which already has far too much power over the electoral process and party process in this country through the muck of the existing election laws still more power over that process. This, in and of itself is a restriction on the freedom of action of popular movements.
Every single effort ever devised to "regulate" corporate power has been captured by the corporations and turned against the people and turned to the advantage of the corporations. Every so-called regulatory agency in Washington is owned lock, stock and barrel by the very corporations that they are supposed to regulate. Given that track record there is no reason to believe that campaign finance reform will be any different.
It's there state a corporate state, after all, not ours. All the trappings of democracy are there to make us believe that that it belongs to us. But as Frank Baum understood more than 100 years ago when he wrote the Wizard of Oz, it's all a sham. It's not that democracy is a bourgeois swindle, but rather bourgeois democracy is a swindle. Any effort to reform or regulate it will only give a corporate state that is not ours still more power, which is to say more power over the 99%.
Of course, most people don't buy into this right now and most people don't support the Occupation movement. Most people, in fact, hardly know that the Occupation movement exists.
Americans are impatient. They are constantly looking for get rich quick nostrums that will, they think, solve all the problems we are in, the latest of which being the notion of campaign finance reform. There are no real get rich quick solutions. The only solution, which the initiators of OWS fully understood and understand is to build this movement until it is big enough so that it doesn't have to make any demands on anyone and it can begin to reorganize society democratically from below as it is doing on a tiny, tiny scale at the occupations themselves.
Think seriously about what an occupation means. The United States began to occupy Germany and Japan in 1945 and its still there. That's 66 years ago. It began to occupy Puerto Rico 113 years ago and its still there. Think of how long the transition from feudalism to capitalism took. About 1000 years.
Those are the terms we need to think in. Those very clearly are the terms in which the initiators of OWS think in which is obvious if you talk to them, if you read the documents they have produced such as the Declaration of the Occupation, and if you think seriously about their whole approach.
This is a big, big project which may well take several life times and we need to be prepared for that and have the patience for that. People say these formulations are revolutionary and the American people are not ready for a revolution. Precisely. I completely agree. Which is exactly one of the main reasons why such a change may take so long and why we have to be so patient about it.
Meanwhile we need to keep on doing what we have been doing, which so far has been a resounding success: organize, organize, organize until one day there are so many millions of us that the 1% and whatever it is they want, whatever it is they say, whatever "laws" they pass will be irrelevant because we will be organized and we will decide and we, the 99% will rule and genuine democracy will at last have been accomplished.
The only reasonable and rational way to seriously "regulate" the corporations is to dismantle them altogether, seize their property and reorganize it democratically from below in the interest of the 99%.
Campaign Finance Reform. Boom!
I like it.
I love this idea. There are so many issues to tackle, but Campaign Finance Reform is a great first step.
Yes, there are many in this forum that are all for this. Unfortunately there are a lot of yahoos in this place who are all for something else.
Just wish this movement could grow up and focus on the actual root cause, the money in Washington. Not holding too much hope for this though.
But Good Luck. You're on the right path.
There are so many things wrong with America right now it is difficult to know where to start fixing it. One thing is certain though, and that is we can get NOTHING done while our elected reps are on the take. There used to be an saying that went; "when the people lead, the leaders will follow". That is no longer true. They're following the MONEY! So, this is where we start. Get money out!! We can discuss what is next in the list of priorities after we fix that. I'm very interested in seeing the creation of a labor party. When the tea party and the OWS crowd understand they agree on more things than disagree, and leave the rest to sober debate, they will form the most powerful political coalition in history. I'm also in favor of electoral reform. We are long overdue for preferential balloting and with electronic voting booths there will no longer be an excuse that counting ballots would be too labor intensive. I also think that televised political ads should be held to the same "truth in advertising" standards as other ad buyers. Why do we allow these people to go on tv and tell the biggest whoppers about each other trusting the ignorant to take those lies to the polls with them? Discuss.
I'm with you!
Campaign Finance Reform. Boom.
Obligatory: http://www.getmoneyout.com/
Well, first a working group will need to be formed for that. I think there is some paperwork for it in the third tent of the tenth row, behind the generators that can no longer be plugged in, but before you get to the make shift trash compactor, which is the two guys jumping up and down inside of a small dumpster. You will have to find a group of people to vote on it first though. They will use various hand gestures which will determine if you are democratically allowed to fill out the paperwork. I'm not sure about all of the mumbo jumbo that happens in the working group. But if you can even manage to get to this stage, it will be a major accomplishment in and of itself. So lets just skip on through to after the working group work is completed. Its probably about mid-April by now. Hooray - everything is thawing outside and it is quite lovely in Liberty Park this morning! I think you now need to find a way to get your working group work on the NYCGA Agenda. Again, this is another hurdle to be crossed, but I bet you can get in there, oh...... it shouldn't take more than two or three months. Thats not very long is it? Considering our economy has been a complete disaster for at least five years now. So, in the scheme of things - whats a couple of more months really!! No time at all!! Assuming this happens by July, now the real fun begins!! Oh wait, what were we trying to do again? I know there was a point to all of this. What? Liberty Park is empty now?! Where did they all go? Damn those anarchists. Now what am I supposed to do with all of this paperwork?
Start a protest? What You Gonna Do by zombiebankdeathsquad enjoy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjPJ45kmDz8&feature=player_embedded
LOL. That's why I like you so much, April. Because you GET IT and you are not baffled by BS! ;)
Yeah, thats me! Quick on the uptake!
Can't wait to see these money-hungry politicians packing up their offices.
I like him. Do you?
Ok!
Who's with you? 99 % is with you, that is why OWS started.
Yeah lets just do little money
Better than what we have now.