The system is broken, and merely electing Democrats will not and cannot, of itself, fix it. Electing Dems is the first step, but ending corporate political speech is the only real foundation for furthering an agenda that puts people first.
So long as corporations have the right to engage in political speech -- whether in the form of direct or indirect campaign contributions or independent expenditures on political ads, progressives are fighting a Sisyphusian battle. Absent reform, the fundamental conflict between the needs and desires of human beings -- food, shelter, medical care, a social safety net, on the one hand, and the corporation's overriding goal of profit maximization, on the other, means that the progressive movement will in perpetuity remain reduced to using all of its formidable efforts scrabbling for small Pyrrhic victories rather than achieving long-lasting policy reforms and true progress.
Proof? Look at all of the public-minded well-intentioned young politicians who become corporate tools over their years in government. See how quickly the loud talk of ethics reforms (read: corporate bribery reform) by the minority party quiets to a whisper once the party achieves majority status. And don't be fooled: the swing of the country to the right over the past few decades is not the action of a pendulum, destined to swing back, but the inevitable result of the influence of corporate funds on government.
In order to restore a playing field in which progressive ideals are truly free to compete with conservative ideals (such as they are), corporate political speech must be eliminated. A democracy requires by its very nature that adult human beings have the right to participate in government. Although a number of Supreme Court cases have found that corporations too are entitled to participate in government through spending funds to influence elections, justification for corporations having such rights is lacking both in the Constitution and in sound political theory.
Now, corporations are more powerful than ever -- Cheney's energy bill, the bankruptcy bill, Medicare Part D, all written by and for their respective industries. The EPA and NLRB are corporate agents. Halliburton and other military-related contracting corporations receive tens of billions for doing very little as our troops die (see Greenwald's film "Iraq for Sale"), our working folks lose their health care and their pensions, and our children remain uneducated. True, this has been a Republican administration for six years. But let's not forget that it was Bill Clinton who gave us NAFTA and a host of other corporate-biased legislation. What is necessary is to use our House and Senate victories and the upcoming victories in Congress and the White House in 2008 as a springboard to fix this rot that is destroying our country.
On this and other progressive blogs, people discuss issues. Taxes, the war, Social Security, the economy, and what have you. And of course the progressive arguments are almost always stronger -- in fact, the progressive argument is often obviously correct. But somehow, in the halls of Congress and at the ballot box, those same progressive arguments either fail to carry the day (when conditions are anything less than overtly dismal to the average Joe), or lead progressives to victory by only the narrowest of margins (when the country has gone so totally to shit, and so much damage has been done, that just repairing the damage in itself is daunting). Because corporate money, lots and lots of it, is more persuasive than a reasonable and correct argument.
Corporate campaign finance reform isn't just a serious issue. It is the most important issue by far, because it provides the foundation for everything else. So long as corporate money flows to or for our elected officials, even the Democrats will continue to screw us. Not because they want to, but because she need to. They need corporate funding in order to be re-elected, and that comes with a price. And Russ Feingold simply will never be able to raise the scratch to reach the White House, even if he wanted to run. And the Ned Lamonts, who refuse corporate money and as a result are shunned even by their own party, will continue to lose to the Joe Liebermans, who are married (in Joe's case, literally) to corporate money.
So whatever it takes, we need to do. And maybe that's a constitutional amendment. The last election showed that the voice of progressive populism is resonating more now than in decades. We now need to take this opportunity to strip corporations of the right to spend money to affect elections and government decisionmaking. A monumental task, and there is no doubt that corporations and the politicians they own will fight us every step, tooth and nail, because they do understand what's at stake. But without these reforms, we progressives will remain relegated skirmishing on the fringes, winning a battle here and there, but, I fear, losing the long war.