Charles Pierce: Super-PAC Tuesday and the American Bribery Trap

[muriel_volestrangler]

(refers to: Ohio price tag already well over $4 million)

Seriously, Willard. Almost four million bucks already? In one state? Why, it seems like only yesterday that you were celebrating your twin victories in Michigan and Arizona by publicly grubbing for small donations, which was pathetic and grasping and low even for a campaign that at this point could play limbo with a salamander. The fact that Rick Santorum and his PAC — which I believe is called ColossalDickPAC 2012, but I could be wrong about that; have I mentioned recently what a colossal dick he is? — have already poured $527,000 into the state, and the fact that N. Leroy Gingrich, Undead Definer Of Civilization's Rules and Leader (Perhaps) of the Civilizing Forces, has been able to pony up nearly as much, would be startling in any other year. But their efforts are dwarfed by the sheer magnitude of the fact that Willard has already been able to spend four times as much as both of them combined. A lot of local-TV ad salesmen are going to be sending their kids to college on John Roberts Fellowships when this exercise in political trollopy is finally over.

It was as though a gentleman's agreement was struck after Florida, which was the last time Romney decided just to money-whip openly the rest of the field, that the discussion of how Citizens United has deformed and perverted our democracy was now over, and this is just the way it is, and get used to it. If money came up at all in the last few weeks, it was in a discussion of what the candidates were doing with it. We heard a lot about what one candidate's attack ads said about another candidate. We heard some whinging from the other candidate, which was followed by an attack ad of his own. What fell out of polite discussion was the deadly serious question of what kind of democracy comes out the other side if the only real measure of a candidate is how much money he can raise, and how much money he can spend.

The example of this presidential election is not promising. Not only is Romney capable of buying himself a lead every time a race gets tight, but the cold, hard reality is that, without their personal sugar daddies, both Santorum and Gingrich would long ago have been left by the side of the highway, drinking sad beers in a cafe with Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, who keeps pinching the waitresses, and Jon Huntsman. This is the way we do politics today. This is the way we keep score. And, once the politics are over, and the various 'hos get back to their real jobs, the rot that money brings into the electoral system starts undermining the government itself. When we talk about "campaign finance reform" in isolation, we overlook the really dangerous corruption of the system that comes when the campaigns finally end. People don't stop being for sale just because they're not running anymore. If they're bought, they stay bought. At that point, this stops being about "campaign finance" and starts being about, for all practical purposes, bribery. It will not be long before we've raised an entire generation of elected officials who don't know any other way to do politics than the way we're doing politics right now. How will reform ever come from them? They won't even be able to recognize the concept. Citizens United has created a great trap for the country from which there may be no real escape.

Read more: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/mitt-romney-super-pac-7012905#ixzz1nsscLORM