More Thoughts on the Republican Convention

Once upon a time, party national presidential nominating conventions were interesting, because they genuinely nominated the candidate. The delegates could spread their votes among several competing candidates, often requiring several ballots until one candidate got the required number of votes. Now these votes are merely a formality and a rubber stamp: who the candidate is going to be is known in advance, so there is no longer a real, meaningful ballot.

So to the people, if the whole thing is kind of ho-hum, that's understandable.

However, some interesting things are going on. Ann Romney, wife of Republican nominee Mitt Romney, is to make a speech. Interestingly, they say she was "involved in crafting her speech." [emphasis added] Of course that implies that hers was not the sole role. I wonder who—what media, political, or PR professionals--had the rest of the role in writing her speech.

Also, Mrs. Romney will read her speech from a TelePrompter. So I for one do not expect real and genuine feeling from Mrs. Romney when she tells us what a wonderful man her husband is.

For more on Mrs. Romney, see my March 21, 2012 blog posting, "Mrs. Romney."

This convention is seeing the ultra-wealthy and corporate lobbyists, who pull the strings, fly into Tampa on their private jets. And they are sponsoring—that is, paying for—events for the delegates which include lavish entertainment. Maybe these wealthy donors and lobbyists cannot hide who or what they are; but the news media have been excluded from these events sponsored for the delegates. What are the wealthy sponsors and organizers trying to conceal?

One lobbyist, who was interviewed on camera, said that these donors and lobbyists are going to expect a payback. Just as one example of who we're talking about: the health care industry, which has an interest in what health-care legislation might be passed—or repealed--is represented by such companies as AFLAC and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. The TV news commentator mentioned our country's almost total lack of limitations on political contributions, which of course is the key to the things I'm talking about. The delegates are usually state and national elected politicians, so their votes in their respective legislatures can be bought by these lobbyists.

Copyright © 2012 by Richard Stein

How Corporations Are Controlling America

The trend continues for America to be controlled more and more by big business—who want everything to go according to what is in their interests—meaning their profits.

For a long time this was accomplished by lobbyists. Many industries have their trade associations who maintain offices in Washington because their chief activity is to marshal lobbyists who try to persuade Congressmen and Senators to vote their way. They do this with persuasion, which is completely legal; but also with favors to Congressmen like gifts, trips, and entertainment, which is not legal. Or with promising campaign contributions, which has become legal since the recent Supreme Court decision known as Citizens United.

Here is an article on how industry influence has prevailed over the interests of the public in the case of the Toxic Substances Control Act.

http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/10/13/reform-of-toxic-chemicals-law-collapses-as-industry-flexes-its-m/

Here is a bit of the history of efforts to rein in industry influence on federal governmental regulation and law-making. Some progress to reduce the influence of corporate contributions to politicians was made by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, often referred to as the McCain–Feingold Act.

McCain-Feingold was upheld by the courts in a 2003 case known as McConnell v. Federal Elections Commission.

A later ruling (2007), known as Federal Election Commission v. Wisconsin Right to Life, Inc., created a very big exemption—but the consequences of this supposedly are still up in the air.

Most recently (2010), Citizens United partly overturned McConnell. Now corporate contributions can once again have a great influence on our elections. The party or candidate who has the most money can buy the most TV commercials. That means more persuasion, which is likely to be effective with voters. And those corporate contributions go much more heavily to Republican candidates. (Maybe now some is going to Tea Party candidates, too; I don't have information on that.) Thus corporate money is achieving a more "business-friendly" America and will continue the process of turning our country toward the Right that got such a big boost when the likes of Scalia, Roberts, and Alito gained seats on the Supreme Court.

Copyright © 2010 by Richard Stein