"Wild Times"

[Doreen Peri]

Cecil... I guess I don't understand it well enough.

[Non Sum]

Implicit in all of this is that votes can be bought (via: ads, rallies, mailings, endorsements, etc.).

Now, I ask those of you who feel this to be a serious danger due to corporate wealth:

1. Will it effect 'your' own vote?
2. Doesn't this fear indicate a lack of faith in the discriminative abilities of the electorate?
3. If you take the electorate (excepting your self, of course) as so easily manipulated by "interests," then what sort of protective cage would have ever proven adequate to the task?
4. Did you really believe that corporate wealth sat idly, and powerlessly, by awaiting this opportunity?

My own responses:
1. Nope.
2. Yep, they're hopelessly easy to manipulate. (This thread proves I'm not alone in this belief.)
3. The only adequate cage is an educated electorate. Never happen.
4. What was always there, though occult, will now be more obvious. Not a big change, IMO.

"Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few." (GB Shaw)

[mnaz]

My answers:

1. No, it will never affect my own vote (he swears).

2. Yes. the electorate is easily, hopelessly spun and "sloganized."

3. Not sure any sort of protective "cage" would ever fully remove dangerous manipulation by interests. Draconian campaign reform maybe, but doubtful. Informed electorate would seem the key. Sure. When pigs fly.

4. It's painfully obvious that the federal government (and the most influential major media outlets) are largely bought and paid for by mega-money corporate interests-- not sure to what exact percentage or degree, or by what specific ins and outs and loopholes and mechanisms of campaign finance and lobbying, but the influence is certainly pervasive already.

And this overall situation seems to overshadow concerns about the electorate in some ways. I mean, I've been aware of a chronic "stupid electorate" problem for decades now, but I guess I always held out a little hope from election to election. Until 2004. With Bush's re-election that was pretty much it. Done. Obama's election was exciting to me-- until I looked a little closer at some of his campaign positions. The machine has too much inertia I suppose. I didn't expect much, and haven't been disappointed. We could reach a point where the electorate's competence is largely immaterial. Does the Two-Party system even provide a real choice any more? Did it ever?

Then again, it's a chicken and egg sort of thing. What does FOX news get, something like 60% of the market? A brainwashed public allows the "buyout" to go on indefinitely. As Hest pointed out to me, Obama did say "Yes we can" IF "you will stand with me." I don't know. What was that famous quote? "The people get the government they deserve," or something like that.

[stilltrucking]

Doreen wrote:

I still don't understand why this is such a huge deal, though. I'll have to think about it some more and do some more research also.

Thanks for your help! I don't watch the news every day like I used to. So, all the "givens" as if I'd know what was going on, aren't given. LOL!

I find the news to be depressing .... I turned it off for a while when Obama, the Nobel Peace Prize recipient, sent more troops to Afghanistan. Then I turned it back on and started to watch again and then the earthquake hit Haiti. I watched that story for a week before I thought I'd need anti-depressant medication and decided to turn it off.

I had to delete something from my artlog before anyone saw it
it was that depressing


Let me get back to you on the research.
I wish I had said unique instead of quirky
you always seem to ask the questions that I need to answer
I suppose I am the one with the quirky mind, no telling what will interest me. I am like "the cat" in Red Dwarf. Crow's mind maybe,
shinny things attract me.

I think one of the points hester was trying to make is that this is not a huge deal on the news, it got a couple of sound bytes and vanished from the radar. Nobody concerned about it except for a few political junkies. So big deal now we are USA Inc. Might work out for the best when China starts demanding we pay our bill. We will just go bankrupt because everyone agrees that foreign corporations like China got no right to free speech in the land of the scared witless.

Anyway be back later with some background info for you.

thanks for being a cyber pal

[stilltrucking]

Wild times
it is all so deja vu
Know Nothings and teabaggers
I never wanted to rise from the masses
always with them
just look at me now

I think about Sarah Palin
and I think about Emma Goldman

Yes we have come a long way baby

[still.trucking]

I thought about this threadtoday when I noticed this article in the newspaper today

Supreme Court won't take case of pair ejected from Bush speech
Justices won't hear bumper sticker case


...Secret Service officials told them that the bumper sticker was the reason for their exclusion from the speech, which was at a public event rather than a political rally

Of course not. Not decent corporation would drive around with a bumper sticker like that.

Sorry to kick this one up but this thread has legs for me. whatever I mean by that.