Hello friends, in this article, I'll discuss why America is sick, and why Bernie Sanders is the cure for our dying democracy. It's no secret that American politicians are largely corrupted by the influence of big money. Their campaigns are funded by these large donors who see their contributions (as well as lobbying) as business investments, largely because the return on investment for those who can afford to buy off legislators and Presidents is extremely, absurdly high!
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Whether or not you agree with Bernie on every issue is actually irrelevant (well, it's relevant, but not nearly as much as the larger picture). Every other Presidential candidate in the race is indebted to big money interests, usually represented by donors who give at or near the $2,700 cap to political campaigns. For the following numbers, small donors constitutes donors of $200 or less.
There are only two candidates who raised more than 50% of their funds from small donors: Ben Carson and Bernie Sanders.
Ben Carson, the neurosurgeon who doesn't believe in science, has raised 63% of his money from small donors: impressive for a political campaign (and a higher percentage than Obama in 2008 and 2012 by the way), but still leaving a large amount of influence for bigger donors.
Bernie Sanders on the other hand has raised 74% of his donations from small donors, which is practically unheard of.
On the flip side, you have the rest of the candidates who raise between 60-95% of their donations through big donors. For instance, Hillary Clinton has raised a staggering $77.5 million for her campaign alone (not including what her Super PACs have raised), only 17% of that money has been from small donors.
Even Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate, has raised only 45% of her campaign's money through small donors.
And that is just for campaign committees. Every candidate in the 2016 race except Bernie Sanders also has a Super PAC supporting them. These Super PACs are "independent" committees that have no donation limits and only have to report their finances twice a year instead of all four quarters. The reason I put quotes around "independent" is because, though candidates are barred from directly coordinating with supportive Super PACs, they still do.
Clearly, Presidential candidates are very much indebted to their big money donors, because without them, they wouldn't have nearly the kind of money needed to campaign on the national level. And that logic also holds true for most Congressional and Senatorial candidates who also raise their money via large donors and occasionally have a lot of "independent spending" on their behalf during the heated election season (more on Congressional elections coming in a later article).
So this is my point. Regardless of what you think of Bernie Sanders' policy positions, the fact that he has no Super PAC and has raised the vast majority of his money via small donations means that he isn't corrupt. And he's the only one who isn't corrupt.
That's right, even Hillary and Martin O'Malley (Martin O'Who?) are corrupted. They might not even realize it, but they owe a lot to their big donors and both Hillary and O'Malley know, should they vote or campaign against the interests of their donors, they won't be able to raise enough money to win re-election.
I don't believe Hillary or O'Malley are innately corrupt. I believe the system is corrupt, and their willingness to participate in that system corrupts them in the process, even if they aren't aware or they don't want to be corrupted. And that is why Bernie Sanders, like him or not, is the only hope the American people have of restoring accountability and integrity in Washington.
He won't do it alone. It'll take all of us pulling for him and also pulling for other progressives running on a similar financing model as Bernie if we want to see real change. No one said it would be easy, but it also isn't impossible: we just have to FIGHT!
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