We spend BILLIONS on political campaigns, there just has to be an honest man in there somewhere, doesn’t there?
In 2012 Barack Obama spent $750 million to secure a second term in the White House. For comparison, some say that’s enough money to send a man to the moon. We the people would’ve been better served if that had been Obama’s destination.
This is not however, a jab at Obama. It is instead a jab against our government, or maybe the lack there of.
Media spending dominated Obama’s budget, making up 65 percent of the 2012 campaign’s $736.9 million in expenditures. This includes outlays such as TV and radio airtime, digital marketing, print advertising and anything else to perpetuate their ruse.
Do you ever wonder where in the world all this money comes from? What’s even scarier is, “What Exactly is it buying?”
Seriously, why the hell would anyone DONATE hundreds of millions of dollars to a Presidential Campaign? Well, they did, and this is how they DID IT…
Source of Funds
| Individual Contributions – Small Individual Contributions – Large Individual Contributions |
$715,150,163 $233,215,440 (33%) $489,660,089 (68%) |
(100%) | |
| PAC Contributions | $0 | (0%) | |
| Candidate self-financing | $5,000 | (0%) | |
| Federal Funds | $0 | (0%) | |
| Other | $522,529 | (0%) |
You can think of it as either 740 MILLION DOLLARS, or ¾ of a BILLION DOLLARS either way, the money was spent to take the guesswork out of our election.
Make no mistake about it, the previous owners of those dollars expect a return on their investment. Which, in and of itself, isn’t unreasonable, until you analyze the source of the contributions and the depth of their expectations.
In the chart above you can see that “Large Individual Contributions” donated just south of ½ BILLION DOLLARS, which is almost 70% of all contributions received. This website is excellent guys. Just give it a click if you wanna know more.
https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/topindivs.php
I’ve looked near and far and have yet to find out what a “Large Individual Contributor” is comprised of. The only things I’m sure of so far, is that they have considerably more money than I do, and are a hell-of-a-lot more willing to give it away.
I’ve spent several hours researching this campaign finance reform issue and have come to the conclusion that if you say you understand it, you’re either one of our current politicians, or just a special kind of liar, trust me, the differences are subtle.
Think about how much power citizens actually have. But sadly, we’re trying to hit a moving target. You see, we, like schoolchildren, have chosen sides.
We call our sides, political parties composed of Republicans or Democrats.
When we play we have only one rule, at no time and under no circumstance will one side agree with the other, on anything. Break this rule and you lose your job, so Sayeth the SOFT MONEY GURUS!
To understand these “sides” it may be easier to think of them as “Gangs.”
The requirements are the same. The Gang comes first. You must lie, cheat, steal, or perform any other heinous crime as required by the Gang. We call it Politics.
You see, dividing us into “Little Gangs” is a huge advantage to the “Large Individual Contributors.”
It not only tells them who we are, it tells them what we believe, and in essence, how to manipulate us.
Can you imagine the unadulterated terror we’d stir up if we voted as Citizens of the USA, instead of Members of a party?
You know, voting with a conscience! Like the founders did. We need this to happen now guys!
If we want our country back, we have the tools available to take it back. They’re basically the same tools the “Large Individual Contributors” used to take it from us in the first place, only without the money. Let’s just call in “voting” without being paid to do so.
For all this to work we have an Over-whelming need, for an Honest Man.
My goodness, maybe that’s the secret guys, maybe, despite all the issues, all the scandals, and all the negative press, maybe we should just vote for an honest guy. You will never find that man as long as Outside Campaign Contributions are allowed. Even if you did, he’d be powerless to exact any meaningful change without our help.
Without this man however, there will come a time, when money will matter more than your opinion, or more importantly, your vote. It’s inevitable and it’s sad, and it is happening as we speak.
It’s also inevitable that our politicians face these pressures on a daily basis. Can you even imagine the mental and moral strain involved? These guys spend most of their time figuring out ways to force feed us things they know we don’t want, but that the Large Individual Contributors have decided we should have.
They may even have to hide it inside other, more popular and less transparent legislation, but they will get it done. Presto, they have now officially bought into a lifestyle where right and wrong is subjective. You have to ask yourself, why the hell would they do that?
It simply has to be a strain on the conscience to repeatedly deceive the very people who elected you to office. Unless, of course, they don’t have a conscience in the first place. Makes you wonder about some of the guys, doesn’t it?
It wouldn’t surprise you at all if I said they do it for money and power would it? And, I’d be right. What’s so brazen about it is that they’ve learned to funnel money around and through the very laws, they have sworn to defend.
Since I’ve retired, I decided I’d try something new, a hobby if you will.
You know, something you always thought you’d enjoy but had never actually tried. I decided to learn something, on purpose.
What I’ve learned about our political system is that we’ve traded moral intent of the law, for a mindlessly loose interpretation of the law that fits the agenda of those in power.
I know it sounds like we are S O L! But actually, we’re not.
You see I’ve found the secret to their success. They do have a couple of things in their favor however. First, they are dealing with the most gullible beings to ever walk this earth, us, and that’s not likely to change much. And second, the level of complication by which their sins can be hidden from us is almost incomprehensible.
In short, with a criminally compliant press, they flood us with only what the want us to know, and everything becomes both irrelevant and unwelcome.
Gosh, how do they do that? It’s gotta cost a lot of money to do that doesn’t it? Well, remember those elusive Campaign contributions and that war chest thing? I just bet they’re the gifts that just keep on giving.
We need leaders to convey our will successfully, and the leaders, must be…, us. Being a leader has only one responsibility at this time, you must VOTE for a guy that will sponsor legislation to eliminate any and all contributions from every outside source other that the AMERICAN CITIZEN.
This should be very easy folks. We are all on the same page surely, we’re doing it for the right reason, you know, “Saving the World”. And, maybe best of all, it cost us nothing to do it.
I’ve seriously analyzed this behavior, and think I have the perfect analogy for it.
Picture if you will, one of the beautiful scenes often seen on Nat Geo or Animal Planet documentaries. This one in particular holds relevance for us.
Starling Murmurations
Videos of flocks of starlings in flight have gone viral.
They feature a stunning example of collective behavior known as a starling murmuration.
These aerial spectacles can be seen at dusk, when starlings flock together and seem to move as one.
What makes them mesmerizing is the strong coherence and extremely synchronized movements the starlings perform.
Scientists have recently determined that starlings in murmuraton coordinate their movements with their seven nearest neighbors
When one bird changes speed or direction, all the other birds in the vicinity respond in kind, and they do so nearly simultaneously. In this way, information spreads across the flock rapidly.
These graceful ballets are often responses to an approaching predator like a hawk, (or maybe a politician), but also seem to occur spontaneously. Perhaps the starlings find their behavior as beautiful as we do.
The secret to success in a Republic is to assure that your “one bird”, is you’re most honest and most trusted bird. After all, I’d have to have a pretty damned good reason to fly around with my beak up someone’s ass all day.
The bottom line is simple. It starts with the next Presidential election and will be the easiest thing you will have ever done. Take the opportunity to vote, vote no to any legislation regarding supporting outside campaign contributions, unless of course, it involves repealing them.
You must also vote against any politician that supports them.
From that point on any politician that does not support campaign finance reform up to and including total elimination of all outside campaign donations, is the enemy.
Murmuration is the answer. After all, even humans can learn from a bird, right?
To affect change, you must affect your small area of influence, and they in turn will affect theirs. And so on, and so on, and so on. Simply vote for candidates that are against any form of outside campaign contributions.
Right now, this very moment, this may be the most important issue we will ever face. We cannot buckle or cave on this issue. We must, with certainty, know that when our politicians are envisioning our future, it is through our eyes, not theirs.
Ladies and Gentlemen we are in luck. We live in a Democratic Republic, and as such, we can change shit if we’re just smart enough to work together.
Our next legislation must be to reverse Citizens United. It has give the power of our votes, to corporations and the huge donations they bring.
You may want to watch this, it’s by Senator Russ Feingold and about as good as it gets at explaining Citizens United. https://youtu.be/KaHX5LebPSc?t=647 What we’re dealing with here is a Supreme Court that couldn’t possibly give a lesser shit about American citizens.
Click here to see how it’s being done now… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campaign_finance_in_the_United_States
Overturning Citizens United will return America, to Americans. 
It’s the right thing to do…
Question a candidate’s stance on campaign finance reform.
If he stumbles on the matter, or becomes flustered when questioned, I’m sorry, but he’s soon to be unemployed, and maybe he should stay that way.
One final thought. I know it must appear that I’m fixated on Campaign Finance Reform. But, it’s only because I am. There are so many issues that must be addressed that it boggles the mind, but, you can believe those issues become far less relevant when they are “BROKE”..
I believe deeply that it must begin with an honest man in the white house. That man must realize that Honesty is not only the best policy, it is the only policy we will accept. There are no alternatives.
His job will be simple. He must do what the American people tell him to do.
Our job is equally as simple, we must locate any and every politicians that supports campaign contributions from outside sources, and remove them from political office.
Now the good news. Though it has taken them years to assemble this cast of bribe sniffling assholes, we can disassemble them within 2 election cycles.
We can affect the change we desire in short order, we have the power. An example is the recent Tea-Party phenomenon. Granted that it was run by a bunch of egotistical incompetent knuckle-draggers, they, as a minority never-the-less, shut down the United States Government. So, don’t tell me we don’t count, or that we can’t facilitate change.
Frankly, if the Tea-Party, with leaders like, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio can make that big of a splash, just think what 300 million citizens can do.
Commentary
It’s easy to bitch and gripe about campaign finance reform without offering any solutions. We seem to forget that it’s our job as citizens to find these solutions.
I personally prefer some sort of public financing of campaigns. Talk to your political representatives. If they support Campaign Finance Reform, you’ve got a keeper. If they don’t, kick him to the curb, he is no value and simply another reason we need reform.
Let’s talk soon.