Forum Post: The First Thing
Posted 12 years ago on Nov. 28, 2011, 10:36 p.m. EST by dbray917
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The single most important thing we could do realign power in the country is to change how elections are financed.
If we could, as Michael Moore has recently suggested, pass a constitutional amendment that fixes our broken electoral system by 1) completely removing campaign contributions from the political process; and 2) requiring all elections to be publicly financed, that would be a huge step forward.
Bingo!
Here's my 2 cents:
There are a lot of improvements that need to be made. The list reforms people Americans want to see is long and varied depending on who you talk to. That said, I believe there is one reform that would provide the American people the best chances of seeing other meaningful reforms actually happen - that is REAL, loop-hope free CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM! I have seen others on this site calling this the "fulcrum" or pivotal issue. Right now the current legalized bribery, pay-to-play system of campaign donations and paid lobbyists has disenfranchised the American voter. Until this is fixed, any other reform the politicians may try to placate us with (be it a change to healthcare, clamping down predatory school loans, new financial regulations, etc.) will be about as effective as a farmer putting a new roof on his CHICKEN COOP, but still letting the FOX guard it.
We need to go back to the original political currency. Instead of the current system of who can collect the most money from corporations and special interests it should be who has the BEST IDEAS to EFFECTIVELY RUN THE COUNTRY (we don't need "Wealth Redistribution," what we need is "Political Influence Redistribution")!
For the sake our our children and future generations of Americans, we need to take back our democracy from the rich and powerful who are using their vast sums of money to "speak" as if they represent millions of Americans. This "Corporate Personhood" that has crept into our laws is allowing them to manipulating our policies in their favor at the expense of the average American (the recent "Citizens United" Supreme Court ruling is a miscarriage of justice and must be reversed. The $50 or $100 a normal American may give to a political campaign becomes meaningless when corporations or other special interests are handing our millions to buy political access to the decision making process.
For decades now the corporations and special interests have had our "representatives" bought and paid for (both on the right and the left). Concentrating our efforts on getting the money out of our politics is the best way we can create an environment in which further reforms can be realized. Until we end the current system of legalized bribery (campaign donations) and paid lobbying our politicians will continue to be the LAP DOGS of the corporations and special interests. What we need first and foremost is real, loop-hole free CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM!!!! If the corruption is not dealt with first, the chance of any other meaningful reforms becoming a reality is almost zero - the special interests will just use their money to buy votes and put forward bills that create loop-holes or otherwise twist the law in their favor. If we want our children to live in a country where there vote matters, we need to get the money out of our politics, otherwise they will increasingly become the 21st century version of the "landless peasant." Spread the word - End the LEGALIZED BRIBERY!!! CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM needs to be THE main goal of the protests!!!
I think another huge step forward is to remove the electoral college. If you vote democrat in a republican state your vote doesn't mean anything. There are very few states, the swing states, where the people's votes actually matter. But the corporate money definitely needs to go then we might actually get some candidates that aren't carbon copies of each other.
We have a large number of great, well thought out, COMPLICATED ideas that will require a huge amount of "selling" and “explanation" and will garner GREAT OPPOSITION.
Every one of our goals can only be achieved by cutting the incestuous link between washington and money - we MUST start here:
..................................ACTION
We need to be realistic & pick an issue that is simple – and that is proven popular -
that 83% of Americans already agree on -
That even 56% of TP already agree on -
that will bring together the people in OWS with the people outside of OWS.
Everybody wins!
Our only immediate goal should be to pass a constitutional amendment to counter Supreme Court decision Citizens United (2010) , that enable unlimited amounts of anonymous money to flood into our political system.
“Corporations and organizations are not a persons &
have no personhood rights”
We don’t have to explain or persuade people to accept our position – we only have to persuade them to ACT based on their own position. Pursuing this goal will prove to the world that we, at OWS, are a serious realistic Movement, with serious realistic goals. Achieving this goal will make virtually every other goal – jobs, taxes, infrastructure, Medicare – much easier to achieve –
by disarming our greatest enemy – GREED.
THE SUCCESS STORY OF THE AMENDING PROCESS The Prohibition movement started as a disjointed effort by conservative teetotalers who thought the consumption of alcohol was immoral. They ransacked saloons and garnered press coverage here and there for a few years. Then they began to gain support from the liberals because many considered alcohol partially responsible for spousal and child abuse, among other social ills. This odd alliance, after many years of failing to influence change consistently across jurisdictions, decided to concentrate on one issue nationally—a constitutional amendment. They pressured all politicians on every level to sign a pledge to support the amendment. Any who did not, they defeated easily at the ballot box since they controlled a huge number of liberal, and conservative and independent swing votes in every election. By being a single-issue constituency attacking from all sides of the political spectrum, they very quickly amassed enough votes (2/3) to pass the amendment in Congress. And, within just 17 months, they were successful in getting ¾ of the state legislatures to ratify the constitutional amendment into law. (Others were ratified even faster: Eight —took less than a year. The 26th, granting 18-year-olds the right to vote, took just three months and eight days.)
If they could tie the left and right into a success -
WHY CAN'T WE ??????????
I feel that we should stay with this simple text to overturn CU:
”corporations are not people” and “money is not free speech”
for four simple reasons and one – not so simple:
1
83% of Americans have already opposed CU in the ABC/Washington post poll and the above
IS THEIR POSITION ALREADY.
2
We don’t have to work to convince people on the validity of our position.
3
Simple is almost always better.
4
This simple Amendment is REQUIRED to overturn CU.
And all other electoral reform can be passed through the normal legislative process.
5
OWS and these pages are chock full of ( mostly ) excellent ideas to improve our country.
All of them have strong advocates – and some have strong opposition.
None of them has been “pre-approved” by 83% of Americans !
Pursuing this goal – without additional specifics is exactly what Americans want.
What do we want? Look at that almost endless list of demands – goals - aims.
Tax the rich. End the Fed. Jobs for all, Medicare for all. So easy to state! Can you imagine how hard it would be to formulate a “sales pitch” for any of these to convince your Republican friends to vote for any of them?
83% of Americans have ALREADY “voted” against CU. And 76% of the Rs did too.
All we have to do ask Americans is to pressure their representatives – by letters - emails – petitions.
Wanna take your family on vacation?
Convince the 7 year old and the 10 year old to go to Mt Rushmore.
Then try to convince them to go to Disneyland.
Prioritizing this goal will introduce us to the world – not as a bunch of hippie radical anarchist socialist commie rabblerousers – but as a responsible, mature movement that is fighting for what America wants.
I feel that using the tactics of the NRA, the AARP an the TP – who all represent a minority – who have successfully used their voting power to achieve their minority goals - plus the Prohibition Amendment tactics – bringing all sides together - is a straight path for us to success that cannot fail to enable us to create and complete one MAJORITY task.
Join the Restore Democracy Working Group at
............. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NYCRDWG
Plan details with supporting documentation at: http://bit.ly/vK2pGI
RDWG regular meeting 6-8PM @ 60 Wall St @ Wednesdays
Since we need politicians to pass an amendment then we need to draw up a petition with as many signatures as possible and demand that they do it.
You need politicians to pass a constitutional amendment.
Thus we come to the crux of the biscuit: the people we need to implement legal change within the system are the very ones profiting from its corruption.
So...
Who chooses who gets the public money?
Who decides how much money everyone gets?
What if I don't like any of the choices that chooser picks?
Can the public at large finance someone who they would rather have as their candidate?
The issue is not where the financing comes from, it is the fact that candidates do not have to list where the contributions come from.
Michael Moore has all the answers! What a paradox. OWS is anti 1% and yet they cant get enough of the multi-millionaire Michael Moore. The guy is all about money. He owns a million dollar apartment on Manhattan Island, owns a 2 million dollar lake house in Michigan, he spends $40k a year for his kid to attend elementary school. He
"I walk among them. I live on the island of Manhattan, a three-mile-wide strip of land that is luxury home and corporate suite to America's elite..... Those who run your life live in my neighborhood. I walk in the streets with them each day" (Michael Moore, Stupid White Men, p. 51). For vacations, he keeps another million-dollar beachfront house in Michigan.
Just ask yourself, if Moore is really offended by executives making so much money, why does he say nothing about, we'll say, David Letterman and Ellen DeGeneres both making $45 million a year? Or Jay Leno making $32 million, Steven Spielberg making $107 million, James Cameron making $257 million, Oprah Winfrey making $300 million, or for that matter, George Soros' billions.
The nation's highest-paid, richest, non-entertainment corporate CEO's make between $1 million and $5 million a year. A handful of them can occasionally hit in the tens of millions in a particular year where they cash in stock options. This is a far cry from the entertainment industry celebrities who CONSISTENTLY make $20 million to $100 million a year. Year after year after year. And, I haven't even addressed the worlds of sports and music.
So, for any of you who are falling for the Michael Moore fictional public persona character, be willing to apply a little logic by asking yourself 3 simple questions:
1.Who makes more money? Wall Street or Hollywood? 2.Who has the widest income disparity, entertainment CEO's or non-entertainment CEO's, when compared to their employees? 3.Who provides more jobs?
Michael Moore isn't really a good guy but still a slightly lighter shade of gray ( as in alignment).
When we do that we are not hypocrites. When he say that he is a hypocrite.