Originally Posted By: The Turtle Moves
Two huge and appalling (to me) threats to democracy in the US: unlimited corportate cash, and gerrymandering.
How can these things be allowed?
Yes, I know about Citizens United; what I don't understand is why there hasn't been more of an uproar about it. Like riots in the streets.
And letting state parties essentially rig congressional elections seems to be a fine old tradition in the States. There are other ways to go about redistricting.
There is a long tradition of political corruption in the U.S. Political "machines" aren't nearly as effective as they once were (even, and perhaps especially in Chicago) but they can still impact things: witness Harry Reid pulling out the remnants of the NV machine to help him squeak a victory out (in a race between two pretty unlikeable people). Or look at the efforts to suppress black votes in Ohio in 2004, or the shenanigans that accompanied the unconventional, non-majority elections of John Quincy Adams in 1824, Hayes in 1876 (the election shenanigans directly resulted in the early demise of Reconstruction!), and Bush in 2000, or the Teapot Dome and Watergate scandals.
The CRAZIEST thing about this election was the Alaska senate race. Bureaucratic mix-ups and an intra-party feud led to two Republican candidates running, with the _incumbent_ as a write-in candidate. She raised massive amounts of money from corporations, plasted the airwaves with the spelling of her name, and after several legal battles in the last week and some behind-the-scenes manuevering by said incumbent's senator father, won the right to have people hand out extra sheets of paper listing the names of all write-in candidates. This seems unlikely to influence anyone's vote until you consider the environment: you walk into a polling place, where all political paraphernalia is banned, register, pick up a ballot... and an extra sheet of paper advertising the spelling of one candidate's name! A little suggestive if you ask me.