The amendment to break up the "too big to fail" banks was voted down by twenty some odd Democrats who knew that if they went against the banks they would be swift boated in the forthcoming elections. The ruling by the Supremes has, essentially, ended representative government in the United States.
Meanwhile, the actions or inactions of government and the oil barons have insured an extension of the depression by putting millions of people who subsisted off the gulf of Mexico into the unemployment lines.
At a time when we disparately need government control of monetary policy and control of the value of the currency we have lost that control.
Most people do not seem be able to handle reality such as the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. We hear nothing but lame crap about Smoot-Hawley, the Fed, and Tax increases and government spending and the lack thereof being the reason for the length of the Great Depression. The reality, of course, is that while the depression was caused by a collapsing financial bubble just as this one, the depression drug on because the middle of the country was destroyed by drought. And as those people who subsisted upon the land relocated to other parts of the nation in search of sustenance we saw massive unemployment everywhere. It is quite amazing that most people have seen the movie "Grapes of Wrath" and still don't make the connection.
The disaster in the Gulf of Mexico along with the forthcoming disaster of climate change will place the middle class of America in the worst position it has been since the Dust Bowl and the government has now ceded control to the private banksters. If the private banks can create money/credit from thin air without any control or regulation as they did in the Bush years then they will control this nation and use the military, the courts, and the laws as they see fit. I wonder why I say "if"?
It will be a very long road to recovery and it may be that recovery isn't even possible. I can think of only one way to get out of this trap and it is to join forces with the Tea Party and the Libertarians in their effort to dramatically increase the power of the state governments. Do not mistake me. I do not propose breaking up the union or reinstating racial and ethnic discrimination. What I propose is a convention of 2/3rds of the states to repeal the 17th amendment. For that is the only politically feasible way (that I can see) that we can repair the damage done by the Supreme court.
In the current situation, the banks, the insurance industry, big pharma, big hospital and big anything else can purchase the senate as they please. The people will have no real voice. But when the people elect their state legislators in smaller districts using door to door campaigning and local familiarity the money and mass media advertising cannot overpower the debate. Candidates must be more sympathetic to the common people or they will not win seats in the legislature. And if those people in turn appoint a senator then the senatorial seat cannot be bought by the banks and the insurance companies. The banks and insurance companies would have to bribe the entire state legislature or to swift boat people who are much better known to their constituents.
Until the recent ruling by the Supremes, I was focussed on dramatically expanding the US House of Representatives to achieve this "smallness" and "closeness" in the election of House members. But the banksters have made an end run on that idea. The power of the House was that all spending bills would begin in the House. But if the government cannot control its own money then this ability to spend is worthless. Any spending bill will simply be shut down in the Senate. The House might be able to withhold funds for war, but that does not help the economy with regard to the middle class. Just about all "progressive" measures require spending and the Senate can block any of these. So no matter what the House might do, the banksters still win.
I am not going to abandon the quest for a much larger and more representative House of Representatives. But the US Senate has shown itself to be the most corrupt body on the face of the earth. And I see no way to empower the people but to have indirect (s)election of the senate. People will need to take control of their state legislatures in order to control the Senate. This will mean that underpopulated states will have even more control. But it beats the hell out of the whole government being run by Wall Street and the emergence of a new fascist nation in the mold of 1940's Germany.