Losing My Republic

I am going to buy a book.  The book is Republic, Lost by Laurence Lessig.  I am buying this book because it addresses an issue that I think is the most important problem threatening American democracy now and for the foreseeable future.

It may not be a threat, but a fait accompli.

Money and Politics should not be mingled to the extent that money becomes more influential than votes.  As it stands now, money is necessary to win elections, and only a few people (or corporations) have enough money to finance the increasingly expensive campaigns on every level of politics.  This is a reflection of the disparity of wealth in the United States, and it is at the heart of the protests ongoing called “Occupy Wall Street.”

I have looked long and hard for a key, some essential factor, in political finances that has both caused the problems we see and that would provide a path towards resolving the problems.  This key has proven elusive, but there may still be a way forward that will preserve our system of government.

Before considering solutions, I would like to discuss the nature and extent of the problem because it affects and infects everything in government.  Money has become a contagion that threatens the health of our country.

The consequences of dealing with a political system that is dependent on donations are not hard to recognize.  If a few people can make or break a politician’s career, then those few people will need to be catered to.  Their wishes will take precedence over any other concerns.  The stronger the politician’s advocacy of the issues of his donors and the more effective the legislative efforts to fulfill the desires of their donors, the more likely they are to receive donations for their reelection campaigns and the more likely they are to be able to raise money for other politicians (or their party).  Rigid political posturing is one result.  Gridlock.  Strategies to defeat their opponents take on a new intensity and compromise is tantamount to treason.  The Constitution and the rules in our legislatures have held the tools for obstruction from the beginning.  They are being used in novel ways now for purposes that were never envisioned by the people that crafted the documents and rules.

Our government is not made to withstand self-destructive or even suicidal legislative maneuvers, but filibuster rules, exclusionary rules, and even government shutdown threats are now almost commonplace.  Rigid adherence to dogmatic positions demanded by financiers have introduced a new rhetoric of inflexibility and resolve that makes compromise impossible and gridlock almost inevitable.

Many of the policies proposed and laws that have been contemplated are clearly intended to benefit the donors who are all, by definition, wealthy.  These policies have been divorced from the Will of the People and even from what would be best for the country by verbal contortionism.   Rich people have been redefined as “Job Creators” in order to entice those who are job seekers to vote for their interests while the majority of these wealthy people and corporations have no wish to create jobs.  Many don’t even have the ability to create jobs for anyone but their maids, butlers and gardeners. 

One might think that the vote would quickly quell any tendencies of politicians to enact legislation exclusively tailored to the wealthy, but the vote itself has been coopted by money – not by purchasing votes directly, but by the use of money to purchase advertising.  This advertising plays on our desires and fears, our prejudices and preconceptions, to present a narrative that is false but persuasive.

A lot of people are, by nature, conservative in the United States.  With a few rhetorical twists, these conservative people, who are not themselves wealthy or mean, cannot see anything wrong with increasing the taxes for the poor and elderly, keeping the “rabble” from voting, eliminating social safety nets for the jobless, poor, mentally disabled, elderly, homeless or hungry.  The money saved, they believe, could be better spent on tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations who would then, they believe, spend this windfall creating jobs.

The fact that this was tried with the tax cuts during the last decade with negligible job creation or business expansion does not seem to persuade them of the futility of this approach.  The plight of the less fortunate does not seem to matter to them since they are not homeless, poor or elderly and can not see the possibility that they may need such help themselves some day.

The reason this strategy has been effective despite the naked self-interest of the wealthy and the detriment of the average American, and indeed the country, is targeted advertising and biased political punditry.  If advertising were not so effective, people of average means would not vote for those who would take more from them to give to people and corporations that are overflowing with cash. 

But advertising is very effective, and advertisements are a commodity that can be purchased, which takes money, which drives the politicians to get more and more money, and so the monetary donations from the extremely wealthy open the door to politicians. There is a mutual attraction between politicians and donors, each seeking something from the other, each willing to give up something in exchange for their needs.

Corporations and the wealthy see their expenditures as investments.  Even small changes in their favor from a bill or tax incentive can mean a “profit” several times the amount of their donation. 

Politicians, on the other hand, have only their votes, their principles, their dignity and honor to offer in exchange for money.

In a way, I can understand how a politician might not even realize that his or her political views have been influenced by money.  I would think that it would be hard to live with the knowledge that one is harming the country and its people for personal gain otherwise.  Sinclair Lewis wrote, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!”

There is another relatively unsavory aspect to this.  Politicians don’t have very large salaries.  Even with the perquisites of office, from travel to fame to health insurance and retirement, the salaries are, at best, “modest” with respect to the donors.  And yet most politicians, and particularly those with connections to those of great wealth, manage to leave office with their finances greatly improved.  The methods are not always obvious, and even when there are obvious methods of reimbursement (like hiring by a company), there is never any contract that delineated the specific actions the politician was to have performed to receive the reward.  That would be illegal.

Many would like to blame the Supreme Court for their ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.  While this is a big part of the problem and helps to augment and perpetuate it, it is not the source of the problem.  Still, by allowing unlimited donations from people and corporations, the ruling enables the wealthy to “buy” influence.  Money talks.  Even to Supreme Court justices.  And that is sad.

Many would blame the Wall Street brokers that wreaked havoc on finances and then “socialized” their debts by taking money from the Federal Government, but that is a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself.  We do need a financial system that functions.  Their influence doesn’t stop with “bailouts” though.  They seek complete deregulation in order to continue to take unprecedented risks or charge extraordinary fees or even defraud consumers with impunity.  Still, this isn’t the source of the problem.

Digging deep into the stinking pile of sewage and refuse, we can start to make out the key to the problem.  It is a simple thing, but crucial to the influence of money in politics.  It is the success of advertising and orchestrated punditry that can make people vote against their own interests and for the interests of those that have only their self-interest at “heart.”  The advertisers and pundits are just “doing their jobs” when they sell their talents at influence.  If their speech were not influential, their services would not be in demand, but in large part it is their talents that transform money into votes.  That is the engine behind the influence of money in politics.  The only other possibility would be transfer of wealth to the candidates themselves.  But that would be illegal…

Unfortunately, knowing that does not suggest a solution.  It isn’t possible to make advertising less influential in changing the opinion of the public.  A solution must be fair and democratic.  It must eliminate the undue influence of moneyed interests and favor the broad interests of the constituents. 

One solution is campaign finance reform.

The cynic in me can see that the extremely wealthy and corporations will fight tooth and nail to prevent meaningful campaign finance reform with every trick in the book, and every legislator that is bought and paid for by these interests will try to jam the works to prevent this, even if it means that the country ceases to exist.  Previous efforts at campaign finance have been rendered ineffective.  Future efforts will be blocked. 

If there is no way to change the way our government works, then our republic is indeed lost.

But I’ll buy the book, and I will read it, and I will continue to hope that the solution will find a way, but I can say that the American People will need to see through the advertising that distorts the truth, but that may only happen when it’s too late.

The extent to which people can be led to vote against their interests, or even to accept a bad solution to a problem, by advertising creating a false vision of reality reminds me of the movie “The Matrix.”  There is a truth; there is a reality.  Seeing it will require a vision that can recognize when one is being manipulated, and that is hard when we have convinced ourselves that we are not, and cannot be, manipulated.

We need a Red Pill.

There are modern historical precedents that illustrate the use of effective advertising, also known as propaganda, to persuade people that the desires of the few will satisfy the needs of the many.  These examples illustrate propaganda playing on the patriotism, prejudices and preconceptions of the people while simultaneously crushing their hopes and dreams.  Knowledge of these precedents is not helpful however because the very words that describe such political movements have been corrupted, and each side will accuse the other of using the same methods.  Both sides can cry “Extremism!” “Fascist!” “Racist!” or “Fooled!” and in the moment it may be impossible to recognize the truth. 

George Orwell saw the dangers of propaganda and the corruption of words by authoritarians, and he expressed those dangers (as well as many other concerns) in his book 1984.  What we see today isn’t what he described, but rather the prequel, the forward, the preface. 

To borrow from T.S. Elliot, this is how the Republic ends, not with a bang of drums or guns, but with a whimper of surrender to the power of money.