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I got a mass e-mail from the Edward Kennedy institute asking for opinions on what issues we need to deal with.
I sent them this:
The most important issue for the country is plutocracy; that threatens solutions for any other critical issue.
The effects include:
We are reaching a point where individual leadership, as exemplified by the Kennedy brothers, has little power or say in our political system, and 'interests' are everything. If a CEO wanted to make a large corporation 'do good' that's not in their profit interest, they wouldn't be selected, and if they were, they'd be removed.
We're getting to a point, the political system is simply, a candidate works for big donors exclusively, and uses that money to fund voter persuasion, without a thought to actually serving the interests of the voters on anything that might conflict with donor interests. That is the opposite of democracy.
But it LOOKS like democracy on the surface. You still have people voting for what they supposedly want. But it is faux democracy.
The solution is to return to the economy of JFK, pre-Reagan, when, yes, he lowered top tax rates, but to about 70% - where they should be again, and he could say correctly that a rising tide lifts all boats. Since Reagan, as all economic growth has gone to the top 1% redistributing $50 trillion from the people to the wealthy, a rising tide lifts only yachts, boats are sinking.
That reversal of 40 years of plutocracy would do much not only directly to help the American people, but it would reduce the power of the wealthy to control the political system and strengthen democracy, and allow other critical issues to be decided more democratically, not only by the wealthy donors.
I sent them this:
The most important issue for the country is plutocracy; that threatens solutions for any other critical issue.
The effects include:
- Money being a hugely important factor in whether a candidate is viable, where only wealthy interests can afford the donations needed, giving them almost a veto power over who can run, and from large to nearly total influence over the recipient
- Funding a billions of dollar opinion manipulation machine, which directly undermines democracy, including organizations such as Heritage, AEI, Cato, Hoover that create propaganda for plutocrats, and a massive right-wing media machine that distributes it
- The corruption of our Congress; over half of members go to rewards in lobbying when they leave office, making them serve the lobbyists while in office to have those rewards waiting - it's legalized bribery
- By taking a huge share of the wealth for themselves, in a vicious circle, that gives the wealthy interests more money to use to buy our political system and protect their wealth and power
We are reaching a point where individual leadership, as exemplified by the Kennedy brothers, has little power or say in our political system, and 'interests' are everything. If a CEO wanted to make a large corporation 'do good' that's not in their profit interest, they wouldn't be selected, and if they were, they'd be removed.
We're getting to a point, the political system is simply, a candidate works for big donors exclusively, and uses that money to fund voter persuasion, without a thought to actually serving the interests of the voters on anything that might conflict with donor interests. That is the opposite of democracy.
But it LOOKS like democracy on the surface. You still have people voting for what they supposedly want. But it is faux democracy.
The solution is to return to the economy of JFK, pre-Reagan, when, yes, he lowered top tax rates, but to about 70% - where they should be again, and he could say correctly that a rising tide lifts all boats. Since Reagan, as all economic growth has gone to the top 1% redistributing $50 trillion from the people to the wealthy, a rising tide lifts only yachts, boats are sinking.
That reversal of 40 years of plutocracy would do much not only directly to help the American people, but it would reduce the power of the wealthy to control the political system and strengthen democracy, and allow other critical issues to be decided more democratically, not only by the wealthy donors.
