Important Daily News You Need to Know in 3 Minutes or Less Today's Issue: The Political System

As Americans struggle with the ongoing recession and an uncertain future, many in government are trying to prove that they are indeed working for the common good. Both major political parties have spent incredible amounts of time and political capital showing that they are the ones to be trusted and relied upon.

Unfortunately, despite all the effort from both sides to convince us of the contrary, the political system is no longer working for the American people. The political system does not work for the people; it works for the people who fund it. Millions of average Americans make small donations to political campaigns during the election cycle, but few individuals are able to garner a large voice.

The real voice goes to the big donors, and every politician absolutely must supplicate them if they hope to stick around in office.

This situation was exacerbated when the Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that corporations would no longer have their “political speech” hindered by campaign finance limitations. Many voters who did not already see the government as being bought and paid for were now completely convinced that America no longer worked for them.

The Supreme Court decision in January 2010 dealt a huge blow to our political system, but that system had already been torn apart by “limited” campaign money for generations. Howard Fineman points out in his latest article in Newsweek that this process goes back as long as we can remember. The big money donors get in bed with the playmaking politicians, and all that our democracy stands for is left by the wayside.

The biggest obstacle produced in this financing chaos isn’t how to deal with corrupt politicians, or how we get the donors out of their ears. The biggest problem is how we cope with everything that has been overlooked while the money pointed our government in the wrong direction.

Fineman goes back to 1996 for the root of the financial crisis of 2008. President Clinton relied on financial backing for his election in 1996, and he rewarded the investment crowd with a repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999. President George W. Bush never met a banker he didn’t like, but the banking cadre was in the White House long before he arrived. When President Obama swept into the Oval Office on a wave of “hope” and “change” it was seen as a major failure by his administration that they failed to enact new financial reforms. However, as a candidate Obama had gathered more support from the financial elite than any other candidate in history. Should we really have been surprised when his “reform” push died down with a whimper?

All of the time and money spent by the big-time donors for their self-serving policymaking has left this country a decade or more away from where it should be in terms of regulation and reform. And the financial cohort is only the tip of the iceberg. Multinational corporations have been pushing politicians into “free trade” ideology for so long that there is virtually no one left who fights for American workers and American jobs. The corporations are simply trying to survive and thrive at all costs, and they happen to have the funds necessary to get the ear of a congressman, Senator, or Secretary whenever they need it.

How many American workers could have used an audience with the president, but were passed over for business leaders with deep pockets? How many regulatory hawks could have foreseen the 2008 collapse, but were forced into silence by their lack of funds?

Discussing the corrupting influence of money in politics is an easy sell; virtually everyone is in agreement that money corrupts the whole system. What we as a nation have never focused on is all the secondary costs of that corruption.

Oil companies being able to lobby for preferential treatment doesn’t just force solar, wind, nuclear, and other alternatives to the side; it also guarantees that America builds its policies around oil instead of other resources. It guarantees that we fight and die in the desserts of the Middle East, because the system never had the sense to imagine that there might be other ways to power our cars and heat our homes.

Big companies being given free reign over their customers isn’t just a problem for those who live through it, it is a problem for everything that comes after. Most Americans hadn’t the slightest clue that there were other alternatives to private health insurance monopolies prior to 2010. Most Americans don’t realize that creating billionaires doesn’t necessarily create communal wealth. Most Americans have no idea that your can increase taxes and increase prosperity at the same time.

Why are they clueless? Because the people who bought their way into areas of influence years ago were simply succeeded by others as time went on. The interest groups whom had the money got what they wanted, continued to make more money, and continued to get more of what they wanted. The interest groups who didn’t have the money never even had a chance to be heard.