The latest co-signed bit of sunshine from the Pennacchio team.
Last week we showed how corporations and special interests hide behind hip, pastoral, patriotic sounding PACs to funnel huge sums of money to Congressional campaigns. As of September 30th, Bob Casey and Rick Santorum shared 239 of the very same contributors. This week, how PACs control our government by controlling the candidates.
Since 1907, it has been illegal for corporations to contribute money to federal campaigns; for unions, since 1943. PACs provide a nifty end-run around the law. Last year, PACs dumped $310.5 million into federal campaigns. And why not? In 2004, Boeing spent $1.6 million on campaigns through its PAC and collected $17.1 billion in government contracts, a 1,068,650% return on investment! There are similar figures [.pdf] for other contractors, and lengthy rap sheets detailing their corporate misconduct, here.
Bob Casey, Jr. says he can take PAC money and remain independent. So why is Mr. Casey’s response to 45 million Americans and 1.38 million Pennsylvanians with no health insurance so anemic? He supports expanding CHIP, which covers children only, and employer incentives, which don’t protect against skyrocketing costs, won’t reduce paperwork, and are not mandatory. We lose business and 18,000 lives [.pdf] each year because of our backward, cost-prohibitive system of health care funding. A 2003 study showed that 2 out of 3 Americans would prefer universal health care to our current system. Why doesn’t the supposedly populist Casey champion universal health care? Maybe it’s because he’s taken money from 28 insurers, 12 drug companies, 11 hospital and 15 medical specialty PACs, many of whom prefer to control their costs by raising premiums and limiting our access to care. This is why we pay more than twice as much per capita for health care [.pdf] as other industrialized nations, nearly all of whom get better results!
Casey says he can’t support a woman’s right to choose or embryonic stem cell research because it’s against his religion. Yet his church opposed the war in Iraq, which Casey says he would have voted to initiate and fund, and which he supports to this day. Why? Perhaps because he’s taken from 15 defense contractors, none of whom would be pleased to see the United States leave Iraq now.
Do politicians like Casey want to take what amounts to bribe money? We don’t think so. They think that without it, you can’t win races. Yet with it, Democrats are not winning races. With it, our civil government, once the envy of the world, has been gutted. With it, we’ve exchanged our common wealth for generational debt. With it, people exist to serve corporations, not the other way ’round. Let’s face it folks, this isn’t working. And every politician who takes PAC money is propping up a system that strangles democracy and picks our pockets clean. Enough is enough.
Chuck always says that you can’t change politics without changing politics. That’s why Pennacchio for PA doesn’t take PAC money. But the other side of the equation is this: we have to take back our government, we have to do it without a zillion dollars, and the people in control don’t want to hand it over. In the weeks ahead, we’ll talk about how we’re going to make it happen. Look for our next mailblast on Rick Santorum, and why it pays to be crazy.
Julian, Stephanie, Sabra, Dan, Liz, Albert, Danie, and Dave
Close to on point is Proximire’s re-election campaign style:
More than one way to get there from here. I think people tend to remember the candidate who took the time to come to their meeting/gathering, and are not fooled by those who just buy tv ads.
You’re right on with this. From what I hear/read/see, Casey Jr. is pissing people off left and right by blowing off meetings with groups. Chuck Pennacchio is constantly out there meeting and greeting.
I am really glad to hear this. Since I’m down in Texas, I have no idea how Chuck’s campaign is going on the ground up in PA. (Though I really believe in what he is trying to do – and have given him some money to back that up.)
One of the great things about becoming more politically involved in the past year, is that at the meetings that I go to – candidates are there! And they not only address the meeting, but they hang around afterwards and talk to me. Little old me. They answer my questions. Directly. Face-to-face.
Which means, they will get some of my money. They will get my time and energy. I will tell all my friends and neighbors about them. And when I do, I can say things like, “Well, I asked her about that, and she said . . .” or “At the Keep Austin Blue meeting he said . . .”
That personal interaction spreads out far beyond the individual voter that the candidate speaks to. Each one creates an ever widening ripple. The more of those ripples a candidate can make, the better.
Actually meeting the candiates has an incredible effect on me. I’ve never met candidates, let alone spoken to at length with candidates before in my life. There was a real sense of change started by Dean in 2004. Casey Jr didn’t get the message it seems.
I’ve met Chuck several times at various events [Drinking Liberally / DFA…] and I was impressed so much that I’m a volunteer on his campaign now. I’ve seen Alan Sandals [another Dem running in this race] around town to at Drinking Liberally and at a couple other functions. Bob Casey Jr? Nowhere. From what I’ve read, he’ll only talk to you if you pony up $10K in advance. And let’s not even get started on Sanitorum, blech.