Why are Pundits Unwilling to Say Pay for Play

[liberalmike27]

I constantly see these journalists and pundits who will point out how much money a certain politician gets from a pharmaceutical, or from the health industry in general.

But I am amazed that I've not seen one of them, not one over time say "Obviously these guys get money from these huge corporations, to pay for the laws they want put in place." You always get some half-assed answer, like "Well, they'll tell you that they aren't influenced by the money they are given," or something like that. I guess a few folks MAY believe that.

But seriously, they are saying, "Oh those congressmen aren't influenced on how they vote, by the millions of dollars this company is contributing to the, how absurd!!" I mean, come on man. It's all about this pretense of "serving" or being "noble stewards," turns of phrase that alwasy leave me laughing derisively.

Just say it!! Yea, Specter got 7 million from the health care industry, and he is backing out of supporting a public option. It's pretty obvious, but any journalist needs to point that out, without fear.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. If only we had strictly publicly financed elections...

[CrispyQ]

3. We'll never get our government back until we do.

Money does not equal free speech.


It's Time to Overrule the Supreme Court
Overturning Buckley v. Valeo is an essential step toward enabling a democratic republic

http://reclaimdemocracy.org/political_reform/money_notspeech.html

snip...

Today, one political class is the overwhelming majority -- we express our preferences with our votes or volunteer efforts. The other class consists of those wielding real power -- the ability to finance the bulk of candidates' campaigns and effectively "set the menu" of candidates from which the rest of us may choose.

The justices' motivation for treating money as speech may not be racist, but the impact is. Major political donors are fully unrepresentative of Americans. According to a 1996 study by the Joyce Foundation, eighty percent of people investing $200 or more in political candidates are males from households with annual income exceeding $100,000, and about 95 percent are white.

Not surprisingly, Congress closely mirrors those distinctly unrepresentative demographics.

When you get into the real money -- donations of $1,000 or more -- the picture is skewed even further. Just one in a thousand adult Americans contributed $1,000 or more to any candidate in the last election, yet candidates for the 2004 presidential nomination raised more than 80 percent of their individual investments from these elites. And people wonder how Congress can consider repealing inheritance taxes for multi-millionaires while plunging us ever-deeper into debt.

[Echo In Light]

2. Because they're not paid to offer their own personal views, but read from a script...

...written/managed by those beholden to America's profits-over-people ideal. And even then i'm sure many of them having long been indoctrinated into a 'professional' mindset likely perceive 'reality' quite differently than those not running in their social circles and playing their reindeer games. That's how some can so self-assuredly denounce the most obvious facts.