Democracy for Sale
I am agog, aghast, astounded, appalled at the Supreme Court’s decision of last week. It seems that many are underestimating the damage this will do to our democracy; well, of the few who heard about this thing. I assume that the perception of most is “Supreme Court decides… BO-RING! Where’s the sports page?” But that illustration requires imagining that anyone reads newspapers these days, which we know is simply not true. More probably, Joe Methhead is watching his ten minutes of CNN to make himself feel smarter, and hears “Supreme Court decides…” and changes to “American Choppers” and yells for someone to bring him more meth.
You may sense rancor, and that is because we allowed this to happen. By our complacency, by our opting for mass entertainment over mass communication, by caring more about the goddamn American Idol than the American president, by sedating ourselves with cheeseburgers and lattes and pornography. We are trained to believe that politics are impolite or boring to discuss, all the easier to make us manipulable. It’s our parents’ fault, too, for preparing a nation where meaning is defined by buying and selling, but just as much our fault for accepting this parody of history.
And in this country where buying and selling is not a means to an end, but the end itself, it’s no surprise that politicians can now be bought and sold. It is almost impossible to overstate the harm that this decision will wreak on our democracy; it is almost impossible to imagine how it will not outright destroy it.
For example.
How could the health care bill have gone to shit? At one point, 80% of the American public wanted a public option. The Congress represents us, right? Google “health insurance political contributions”. How much did you donate to McCain or (for fellow Texans) John Cornyn? Something between zero and zero dollars, is my guess. Why the hell should they listen to you? And so our ostensible representatives vote against our interests. That’s how it happens. It’s as simple as that.
We know from Obama’s trouncing of Clinton and then McCain that the campaign with the most money can reach the most people most effectively; but Obama’s money came from the people, from folks who contributed for the first time ever to a candidate in whom they believed. And he knows it. These were people busting open their piggy banks and sending in ten dollars, fifty, a hundred. Corporations give millions, hundreds of millions, even billions. There is no way that our contributions - and therefore the importance of our interests - can compete with theirs.
These days, corporations split their donations pretty evenly - Coca-Cola may give as much to the Democrats as to the Republicans. All this means is that both parties will be equally in Coca-Cola’s pockets. But wait! Does the equal contribution they get from Pepsi-Cola mean that they will cancel each other out? Not at all. Pepsi-Cola and Coca-Cola have several mutual interests. Neither wants to be taxed. Neither wants to obey environmental regulations that cost money and time. Neither wants to spend the time and money to treat its workers humanely. These things transcend party lines and become a matter of us and them. You are not a corporation. You are a human, and your worth is not determined by your intelligence, or compassion, but by the money in your pocket. The currency of you is devalued. This is the triumph of our weird government-capitalism coition.
I notice that the webpage for emigrating to Canada is bogged down today.