Wake-up call: long after Bush, Rove, & Cheney leave, the lobbyists will still be there

[rudy23]

I think that's what we're waking up to here. We think we have a majority in Congress, but in reality, it's about 95% from the Pro-Corporate party, and 5% from the Pro-American party.

We need campaign finance reform. Yesterday.

[magellan]

1. Ain't going to happen

Your point is dead right. But there's only one way we'll see real campaign finance reform and an end to corporate influence that overrides the will of Americans, and it'll mean rebuilding the government from the ground up. (And fumigating the hell out of the basement too.)

[Jim__]

2. I agree that the lobbyists and corruption are the real problem.

But, I'm not sure what we can do about it. The lobbyists provide the money that pays for the ads that convince people how to vote. The media has no interest in putting an end to that - they're getting rich off it.

Somehow, people, everyday people, need access to communication channels. How do we have mass communication outside of the media?

[deutsey]

3. Well, what endures is the power structure that the lobbyists represent

[rudy23]

5. Campaign finance is the answer--but how do a bunch of us ordinary people start down that road? nt

[loyalsister]

4. Not only that.....

Many of his staff and appointees will have found jobs AS lobbyists.

[wiggs]

6. Agree for the most part. But keep in mind that the number of lobbyists

in dc DOUBLED in the early years of this administration. Then you can talk about Abramoff and Delay and Cunningham and K Street and industry hacks being appointed to regulatory positions. It think it is pretty clear that one party has embraced the gov't/corporatist alliance more than the other and more than at any point in our history.

Totally agree that finance reform is needed yesterday and that it isn't about dems vs pugs, progressives vs conservatives, DUrs vs Freeps, right vs left, secularists vs fundies....it's about all of us, your 95%, against those who wish to concentrate power and wealth into the hands of fewer and fewer people. Problem: it has taken decades of planning and billions of dollars to achieve the polarization we have today and I don't see enough people realizing the real problem in numbers it would take to change it.

Absent the number of enlightened people, we would need an electable, hero immune to corporate influence that could set things right. I don't see one of those in the works.