When we talk about "buying" elections, we only talk about the "buyers." Who's doing the selling?

it's abundantly clear that seats for our elected officials are being bought... this isn't news... it's been happening for a long time but never more visibly than in this week's wisconsin recall election... what often gets left out in the buying and selling discussion is where all that money is going... yes, it's easy enough to say it's being spent on political advertising... that's a no-brainer... but just as we're coming to find out just exactly who is doing the "buying," we need to know just exactly who all that money is going to... besides the source, it would be very useful to know how much media outlets and advertising firms are making and the details of the majority ownership - by name - of those outlets and firms... my hunch, which is also undoubtedly a no-brainer - is that we would see a maze of interlocking interests, back-scratching and mutual hand-washing... 

from the huffpo via the republic report...

For decades, broadcasters have kept the public in the dark about their massive election-year windfalls.

Those that own news outlets prefer silence on this issue. (See Disney, which owns eight ABC stations reaching 24 percent of the U.S. population, CBS Corp., which owns and operates 28 stations, Comcast, which provides news programming to more than 200 NBC affiliates, and News Corp., which owns and operates 27 local affiliates) Covering this story exposes their conflict of interest, in which profit-taking trumps the news media’s duty to educate viewers about the forces behind modern-day elections.

In the two years since Citizens United took effect, Super PACs and independent third-party groups have spent hundreds of millions to inundate the airwaves with political ads. That amount is projected to double before viewers become voters in November.

 The FCC’s response was an obvious solution: Require stations, which already archive this information for public view in paper files, to post ad spending data on the Internet, where anyone can see it. As viewers are being hammered by deceptive political ads we need a full accounting of the billionaires and corporate slush funds that stand behind this misinformation. 

but... 

But as with any hard-won reform in the age of big-money politics, this positive change can be undone by a generous application of corporate lawyers, lobbyists and campaign contributions.

the cardinal rule, "follow the money," is anathema to our super-rich elites and their bought-and-paid-for elected puppets... god forbid we should shine a light on their shell game...

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What it costs to buy an election

high and getting higher...

from CleanSlateNow...



from OpenSecrets...



ask yourself this question... where does all this money go...? in other words, who really benefits from all this money being spent...? as with most everything in our society, if you want to know what's really going on, follow the money...

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You vote for the president to spend some part of 20% of his days raising money for his own future from the incredibly wealthy

tom engelhardt...

[Recently,] President Obama hustled around my hometown, snarling New York traffic in the name of Campaign 2012. He was, it turned out, “hosting” three back-to-back fundraising events: one at the tony Gotham Bar and Grill for 45 supporters at $35,800 a head (the menu: roasted beet salad, steak and onion rings, with apple strudel, chocolate pecan pie, and cinnamon ice cream -- a meal meant to “shine a little light” on American farms); one for 30 Jewish supporters at the home of Jack Rosen, chairman of the American Jewish Congress, for at least $10,000 a pop; and one at the Sheraton Hotel, evidently for the plebes of the contribution world, that cost a mere $1,000 a head. (Maybe the menu there was rubber chicken.)

In the course of his several meals, the president pledged his support for Israel (in the face of Republican charges that he is eternally soft on the subject), talked about “taxes and the economy” to his undoubtedly under-taxed listeners, and made this stirringly meaningless but rousing comment: “No matter who we are, no matter where we come from, we're one nation. We're one people. And that's what's at stake in this election."

Outside his final event, Occupy Wall Street protesters saw something else at stake, dubbing him the “1% president.” The end result from a night’s heavy lifting: $2.4 million for his election campaign and the Democratic National Committee, nowhere close to 1% of what they will need for the next year.

These were the 67th, 68th, and 69th fundraisers attended by Obama so far in 2011, or the 71st, 72nd, and 73rd. (It depended on who was counting.) In either case, we’re talking about approximately one fundraiser every five days, a total of 6% of the events in which Obama took part in this non-election year.

Think about that. You vote for the president to spend some part of 20% of his days raising money for his own future from the incredibly wealthy. Or put another way, the Washington Post now estimates that if you add in the non-fundraising, election-oriented events that involve him -- 63 so far in 2011 -- perhaps 12% of his time is taken up with campaign efforts of one sort or another; and this is what he’s been doing 12 to 24 months before the election is scheduled to happen.

[...]

It’s clear enough -- or should be by now -- that the electoral process has been occupied by the 1%; which means that what you hear in this “campaign” is largely refracted versions of their praise, their condemnation, their slurs, their views, their needs, their fears, and their wishes. They are making money off, and electing a president via, you. Which means that you -- that all of us -- are occupied, too.

So stop calling this an “election.” Whatever it is, we need a new name for it.

the country belongs to the 1%... we're just their indentured servants...

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