As far as I can tell Open Secrets is a non-partisan organization. If anybody can find any other contribution data for this election this please post it.

But we also need to point out that Obama has been the recipient of the lion’s share of PAC/corporate money, far more than the Republican candidates combined. I think that says exactly who Corporate America is supporting.

Obama/Democrats only jumped on the “tax the rich, tax the corporations” issue to promote the differences in the Parties, knowing full well how it would be received. You fell for it. Follow the money, not the rhetoric.

It might be a pipe dream to hold elected politicians strictly to their campaign promises, but shouldn’t we at least expect them to not do the opposite of what they say, the opposite of what their Party supposedly supports, and the opposite of what the average American claims to want?

Compromise, sure, but the opposite?

And why is it impossible to restore our rights as outlined in the Constitution? Because the bureaucrats and some law enforcement claim it would hinder their ability to catch terrorists? What a load of BS. We didn’t need these spying on our own people abilities for hundreds of years and we survived. We don’t need them now.

The money pouring into Republican PACs from corporations and from a few billionaires makes it impossible to be non-partisan on this subject. Whether you believe Obama was sincere in his stance against PAC money being used in his campaign, it would have been nice to put this to the test. Unfortunately he had to back off and endorse Democratic PACs.

Jon writes that that the best funded campaigns are always for maintaining the status quo. Ironically, despite screams of anguish from the corporatocracy, the Obama status quo up until now has benefitted them greatly. What they seem to be afraid of is the change the Democrats have been trying to make in said status quo.

In this election the Democrats have to try to play catch-up with the Republicans who want to derail Democratic initiatives to make corporations and the super-wealthy pay what they claim is their fair share of taxes.

In my opinion it is a pipe dream to hold elected politicians strictly to their campaign promises. I would like to see a candidate stand a chance of getting elected is he or she added a real politics proviso to promises saying “I will do my best to make good on these promises.”

Instead we have an electorate that wants Democracy to work but somehow believes we can have a president with the power of a dictator.

If there is one thing that stand a chance, however remote, of being achieved to make our elections fairer it is to ban PACs, have public funding of campaigns, and a strictly enforced limited on how much an individual can contribute so true grassroots efforts can make a difference.

Of course we could always make lies and distortions a capital offense in campaign debates, speeches and advertising, but then I am getting all Jonathan Swift again.

With ‘first past the post’ and ‘winner take all’ results, there can be no 3rd parties. It has been mathematically proven that under those conditions all rational voters and voting must devolve into a two-party system.

(Not that all voters are rational, but hey… ;-P

With ‘winner take all’ there is no minority representation. None whatsoever. Voting for the “Green” party in South Carolina is, for all intents and purposes, pissing into the wind, and so why bother? Might as well stay home.

And sometimes there isn’t even majority representation. See Gore winning the popular vote, and Bush winning the Electoral College vote, and ask how many Gore supporters had their voices heard during the Bush administration.

The system itself is defective. Until there is proportional representation, voting for change is completely pointless.

Finally, the status quo is by far the best-funded of all campaigns. After all, it is those who have profited the most under the current regime who have the most financial power to enforce that what is will continue to be.

So no, there will be no peaceful change. But those who make peaceful change impossible, make violent change inevitable* – Sooner or later.

Jon

* Paraphrased from a quotation attributed to John F. Kennedy. The Arab Spring is a case in point. J.

And yes, for huge piles of money, the very best care is still found, for now, in the USA, because when those doctors were going through school the USA had a well-funded educational system.

This is a) not an option for the general public, and b) not a situation likely to last.

J.

What’s the point of elections?

Oh right, to placate the masses…