Part 1: American Politicians Are "Just Not Into You"

Note: Today's post should have been posted yesterday since it is the first post in our theme, "American Politicians Are Just Not Into You." It was early yesterday morning when I mistakenly posted the third post and not the first one in the series. I apologize for not being awake enough for getting the series correct! However, regardless of the sequence, the message is the same: America politicians are just not into you and I, they prefer to take care of their monied backers and financiers and their own personal wealth and greed.

We are fast approaching the November midterm elections so the promises and vows from the American political class are starting to pile up. They are going to make life easier, reduce taxes, save the middle class, fix all of our problems, end poverty, and wondrously cater to all of our needs and fears for every single American. 

The problem with these promises is that probably about half of those politicians making the promises are already in office and for the most part, their failures have made the country as screwed up as it is today. Wasteful government spending, corruption, cronyism, ineffective and inefficient government programs, etc. all occurred while they were in office. Why would we believe them now that all of a sudden, if reelected, they would somehow now, miraculously fix all of the stuff they have either broken themselves or ignored during their tenure in office?

The reality of the American political system today is that our politicians do not really care about what you and I think, need, want, and require. We only serve one purpose for them: our votes at election time. Once in office, they have other masters and other entities that they focus on, not us. Those entities include their perpetual reelection campaigns, their personal financial gains, their business and union cronies, campaign donors, their five week vacations, etc. 

To prove our point, we will spend the next two days proving that you are rather insignificant to our political class. They have other interests, priorities, and focus points while in office. To borrow a movie quote, they are “just not into you.”

1) The main driver of our theme over these next few days is an article written by Mr. Wynton Hall. The title of his article is, “Study: You Have ‘Near Zero’ Impact on U.S. Policy.” Important points in the article include the following:

• The premise of the article is based on a new political science study, "Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens." 
• The study is will likley appear in an upcoming issue of Perspectives on Politics.
• It was authored by Princeton University Professor Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Professor Benjamin Page. 
• The bottom line conclusion of their research is that corporate interests and ultra wealthy Americans are really the controllers of U.S. government policy and direction.
• They have so much control that "the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." 
• American University Historian Allan J. Lichtman, recently reviewed the work and concluded that the research is "shattering" and "should be a loud wake-up call to the vast majority of Americans who are bypassed by their government." 
• The research is based on the analysis of 1,800 policy issues which led the authors to realize that government policies and laws almost always ignore the viewpoints and wishes of average citizens.
• Instead, sitting politicians usually adopt views and preferences of wealthy business and other interests when enacting laws and regulations.

Gilens and Page make the following depressing, but probably accurate, observation: "If policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America's claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened." 

In other words, politicians are “just not into you” making their election a charade of false promises in order to facilitate their own greedy and selfish interests, interests that are facilitated by the wealthy and few.

2) One of President Obama’s biggest election promises, or lies depending on your perspective, is that no big time lobbyists would hold any high ranking or important positions within his administration. This would appear to be a good thing since it would counter the trend we just discussed of wealthy business and other interests having too much say in American Federal politics.

But alas, like most, if not all, of Obama’s election promises and vows, this one is also a false promise or outright deception, depending on your perspective. Politico’s Byron Tau recently reported that the Federal Office of Management and Budget recently released a new government rule which will allow registered lobbyists to participate in policy making discussions. This is the result of a judge’s ruling from earlier this year.

As a result lobbyists for corporations and industry groups can now serve on more than 1,000 government industry boards, panels and commissions. providing the private sector a role in decision-making across the executive branch, according to a copy of the rule published on the Federal Register site.

While the judge forced this issue on the administration, two distressing observations arise. First, it does not appear the administration is going to appeal or fight this ruling, either in the courts or legislatively. It will just go along with it and allow business interests to have a much more substantial say and influence in government policy making. 

Given how passionate and convincing the President was on the campaign trail relative to blocking lobbyists’ influence on and how he has disregarded many other legal requirements at his whim, one has to think that this is not a big issue for him, it was just a campaign ploy.

Second, it is not clear how closely he was adhering to his campaign promise anyway before this lobbyist victory in the courts. According to a recent Politico count, despite campaign promises, around 70 corporate, for-hire or association lobbyists have all joined the Obama administration in significant position of influence.

Another campaign promise broken, possibly because the President is “just not into you.”

3) Unemployment is still high, average wage levels are falling, economic growth is anemic, household incomes are falling, and the overall economy is still weak, many years after the end of the recession. Americans are hurting. Well, most Americans are hurting. If you last name is Pelosi, and you still have a lot of influence in the Federal government, than life is pretty good, even if it is at the expense of the American taxpayer.

According to a recent Associated Press report:

• Nancy Pelosi helped to direct more than a billion dollars in Federal transit subsidies to a company operated by a wealthy Democratic party campaign contributor.
• By the way, Ms. Pelosi’s husband is a major investor in that transit company.
• According to the Associated Press report, Ms. Pelosi had worked for many years to steer Federal taxpayer funding to a light rail project in San Francisco’s Mission Bay neighborhood, significantly increasing the value of Mission Bay real estate.
• The transit company’s CEO, Marc Benioff, is a high-dollar Democratic donor with Pelosi and her leadership PAC among the recipients of his large campaign contributions. 
• A main contributor to the increase in property values in the Mission Bay area is the expansion of the city’s Third Street Light Rail line. Pelosi has been the expansion’s champion at the Federal government table. 
• Since 2003, she has secured well over a billion dollars for the project in the form of earmarks, Federal funding agreements, and economic stimulus program funding.
• Two transit stops on the extended light rail line are about three blocks from a four-story office building owned by her husband, Paul Pelosi, a reality that will further increase the values of property owned by the Pelosi family.
• Benioff made two $2,500 contributions to Pelosi’s reelection campaign, he gave $5,000 of Pelosi’s PAC, and he gave $15,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. 
• Those contributions happened just four months after Pelosi secured $967 million in Federal funding for the Third Street light rail project.

Since you and I are likely not able to contribute tens of thousands of dollars to politicians reelection campaigns, that may be why they are “just not into you.”

That will do it for today but we are just getting warmed up. Today we proved what we all have sensed all along: 1) statistical analysis and research conclusively proves that Washington politicians couldn't care less what you think and need, 2) despite the promises, high powered lobbyists representing wealthy interests continue to infect the Washington government bureaucracies, and 3) long term politicians like Nancy Pelosi are more than willing to trade off political favors and taxpayer wealth for personal gain.

Proving once and for all: today’s American politicians are “just not into you.” Except when you are voting.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

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Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w