Put The Sign on The Lawn

     The for sale sign that was up around the Political Party’s various headquarters and by extrapolation, the Congress has just gotten bigger and added some neon and a wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube man, (in the shape of John Boehner or Nancy Pelosi? That would be kind of funny I guess). We the people have officially been served notice that henceforth, those sworn to represent us, to be our voice in the legislative process…are no longer necessarily working for our best interests. As a student of history, I am certainly not shocked by this, as it has always kind of been the way of things. But it was always done, for better or worse, under cover. But with 2010’s Citizens United and now McCutcheon vs. FEC, the SCOTUS has decided that it no longer has to be “backroom”.  So in essence, our Congress has gone from bizarre to bazaar.

     I could get all partisan (as some have done) and note that the five (5) that voted in favour of McCutcheon were from the “conservative wing” and were appointed by GOP Presidents, and all the rest of it. But you know what…that doesn’t figure into this. This is also the same court that approved The ACA, so “who appointed who” is a moot point in my eyes. Both sides are culpable here, both sides have upped the ante to the point that is at now. And both sides are benefitting from the obscene infusion of money into the electoral process. So one side has The Koch Brothers, and the other has George Soros. One side has The NRA, one has The UAW.  So while some will say that one side or the other is to blame, I say that’s codswallop. To me, this is about (as a good friend calls it) The Fix. Those that have the power want to keep the power, and if it calls for gerrymandering a district or putting one’s principals aside by taking campaign money from some of the less than honourable groups  that have their own agendas, (Monsanto for example) to make that happen is needed, so be it.

     I think of all of the things that really irk me about these two (2) decisions, the “reasoning” used is perhaps the most galling. Both decisions stated that money was tantamount to speech. Aside from the surface absurdity of a statement like that, the idea of this is anathema to everything we are supposed to stand for in the country.  We’re the “no taxation without representation” crowd, remember? We’re the country that took on the (at the time) mightiest empire in the world, because we didn’t want a monarch. We came up with two (2) houses of Congress to ensure that there was equal representation. What happened to that? I think there was another rule change

We all learned The Golden Rule when we were kids; do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Even I follow that one. It’s easy, it’s sensible. Now alas, the olde joke about The Golden Rule looks to be the truth now: Whoever has the gold makes the rules. This is now what we’ve become; thanks to two incredibly short-sighted and flat-out awful SCOTUS rulings…we are now, officially…a plutocracy.

May peace come to us all.