Ending The Hidden Unfairness In U.S. Elections

www.VoteFair.org

Part One:  Getting Oriented

We are not incorruptible; on the contrary, corruption is making sensible though silent progress.

Thomas Jefferson, Third U.S. President and writer of the Declaration of Independence

Chapter 1

The Slime:  Following The Political Money Trail

In this chapter let's follow the trail of money in politics to see where it leads.  As you will soon see, the trail leads into backroom meetings of committee members who are chosen by political-party leaders who, in turn, are heavily influenced by campaign contributions.

Disease Of Cashus Influentious

A disease called cashus influentious has quietly infected U.S. politics, and it now clogs the workings of democracy in the United States.  To learn more about this disease, let's take a journey into the back rooms of politics.

It is in these back rooms that money is used to choose which people appear on the ballot.  As a result, the people you would really like to vote for don't even appear on the ballot.  Whoever you vote for has already been approved by the people who use money to control politics.  This is why the actions of Governors, state legislatures, Congress, and the U.S. President are heavily influenced by people and corporations with lots of money.

The result is a big focus on passing laws that increase corporate income through tax breaks, government subsidies, and monopolies.  These unethical ways of increasing corporate income are not appreciated by a majority of voters.  Why?  Because those voters are the taxpayers and consumers who pay for these tax breaks, government subsidies, and monopolies.

Voters watch in frustration at the effects of cashus influentious.  Voter frustration increases while politicians fail to restore the former high quality of U.S. public education, fail to dramatically reduce crime, fail to make health care affordable, fail to protect the environment, and continue to behave in ways that are frequently unethical.

When voters finally succeed in getting Congress to pass a new law that sets limits on financial contributions, the law fails to reduce the influence of money in elections.  Alas, as time passes it becomes clear that powerful politicians figured out ways to get around the new law before it was even passed.

As we investigate the dark side of elections, let's not forget the ideal of democracy; the one we learned about in school.  In an ideal democracy, elections provide a fair process in which citizens, in their role as voters, can select government officials who are motivated to do what the voters want.

Unfortunately the United States uses primitive voting methods that make it easy for cashus influentious to thrive.  Fortunately there is a cure for cashus influentious.  The cure involves adopting fairer voting methods.  You'll learn about these voting methods in Part Three.

To better appreciate the cure for cashus influentious, let's first understand the symptoms of the disease.

Paying For Access

Suppose there is a politician named Clif Clifford.

Clif lives in Ohio and is finishing his second term as a state representative in the Ohio legislature.  Now he wants to go to Washington DC as his district's Representative in the U.S. House of Representatives.  Clif is a Democrat, so his first challenge is to win the Democratic primary election for that seat in Congress.

At a fund-raising event, Clif is introduced to Lester Seedum.

Lester says I'm from an organization named Citizens for Superior Foods, and the members of our organization would like to donate a total of $5,000 to your election campaign. Clif is delighted and says he is certainly in favor of food improvements.

Lester continues by saying Our organization is opposed to the recently proposed requirement for indicating whether food ingredients are from genetically engineered plants. When Clif noncommittally says I see, Lester explains Using produce from genetically engineered plants results in lower food prices.  But the stricter labeling requirements will increase the price of all labeled food. To the question What is your organization's position regarding the safety and nutritional concerns that many consumers have?, Lester replies Those claims are not supported by any research results, and, in fact, research shows that genetically modified plants provide food that is completely safe, without any loss of nutritional value.

Clif knows there is no need to make any decision at this time about how he will vote on this issue.  At this point both men know that Lester is simply ensuring that if Clif wins, Clif will be more receptive to meeting and talking with Lester when he calls Clif's office.

Funding Both Sides For Guaranteed Access

What Lester doesn't mention to Clif is that Citizens for Superior Foods has donated even more money — $10,000 — to one of Clif's opponents in the other political party.  Why donate money to candidates in both political parties?

Let's suppose that Clif's Congressional district has somewhat of a balance between Republican and Democratic voters.  This balance makes it difficult for campaign contributors, such as Citizens for Superior Foods, to predict whether the general election will be won by a Republican or a Democrat.  Donating money to one candidate in each of the two primaries helps to defeat the other, less-liked, primary candidates.  In this example, Citizens for Superior Foods prefers that the Republican recipient of their money wins the Congressional seat, but they are giving money to Clif for the purpose of defeating his Democratic rivals.  This decision is based on the knowledge that one of Clif's strongest Democratic competitors is in favor of the food-labeling law they oppose.

An added bonus of contributing money to candidates in both political parties is that, regardless of the outcome, the organization gets better access to whichever politician wins.

Up until the mid-1900s business owners and wealthy individuals tended to support Republican candidates more heavily than Democratic candidates because the Republican candidates shared more of the goals of the wealthy.  In contrast, Democratic candidates heavily depended on contributions from labor unions and less-wealthy individuals.  But voters tended to elect Democrats more often than wealthy contributors could accept.  After awhile, wealthy people realized that it was in their best interests to also give financial support to Democratic candidates.  This way, regardless of which candidate won, wealthy contributors could go to the elected official and say I contributed lots of money to your election campaign; could we talk for a few minutes?

In case you need an actual example to latch your mind onto, consider the case of one company, Archer Daniels Midland, that, during a single election, gave more than $480,000 to the Democrats and more than $345,000 to the Republicans.  What were the benefits?  This company has most of the market for a particular manufactured substance (ethanol) and receives enormous tax subsidies that, over a five-year period, cost taxpayers about $3,600,000,000 (more than three billion dollars)!

Campaign contributions to candidates of both the Republican and Democratic parties are quite affordable because there are only two political parties to which donations need to be made.  Major contributors seldom donate money to third-party candidates because those candidates rarely win elections.

Senators Are Even More Expensive

How much money in campaign contributions does it take to get elected to the U.S. House of Representatives?  It costs about one million dollars.

Compared to members of the U.S. House of Representatives, U.S. Senators are even more influenced by money.  The average amount of money a Senator receives in contributions during an election cycle is about five million dollars.  (The details are available at OpenSecrets.org.)  This cost for a Senate seat is five times the cost of a Representative seat.  There are several reasons Senators are more expensive than Representatives.

Congress consists of 435 Representatives and 100 Senators.  There are more than four times as many Representatives as Senators, so one Senator can be thought of as having more than four times as much power as one Representative.  For this reason it makes sense that a Senator would receive at least four times as much money as a Representative.

Another reason Senators are more expensive than Representatives is that Senators have powers that Representatives don't have.  Specifically Senators vote on treaties with foreign countries and participate in choosing ambassadors to foreign countries, judges for the U.S. Supreme Court, and some other officials.  Choosing judges for the Supreme Court is especially important politically.  These extra powers are worth extra money for organizations that buy influence.

Yet another reason Senators are more expensive than Representatives is that it is unusual for someone to become a Senator without first serving as a U.S. Representative or state Governor.  Therefore, Senators have already repeatedly demonstrated a willingness to be a puppet, er..., to go along with many of the desires of campaign contributors.  That willingness attracts extra financial support.

Why Committee Chairmen Are The Most Expensive

Let's suppose that Clif has noble goals and intends to keep his promise of voting for laws that are in the best interests of a majority of voters, and voting against proposed laws that would not be in their best interests.  Can he keep his promise?  Unfortunately, no.  Virtually every vote in Congress, whether it is in favor or against a proposed law, involves compromises.

The proposed laws — which are called bills — that U.S. Representatives and Senators get to vote on are created in Congressional committees.  These committees virtually always put into the bills some features that are favored by the organizations who contribute large campaign contributions.  Sometimes campaign contributors have so much influence that a bill appears to have been written by these contributors.

The result is that every bill contains some features that benefit many voters and some features that benefit campaign contributors.  This combination makes it impossible for a Senator or Representative to always vote against bills that contain laws that most voters disapprove of, and only vote in favor of bills that only contain what most voters would approve of.  This concept is so important it's worth repeating.  The bills from Congressional committees always contain what most voters would consider to be both good and bad features, so it is impossible to vote in ways that only support good laws and never support what most voters would regard as bad laws.

As you can see, the power of Congress is in the hands of Congressional committees where the bills are written.  Campaign contributors know this, so they funnel more of their campaign contributions to Congressmen who have the most influence in the most important committees.

Big campaign contributors also channel more money to members of the committees that write laws having the most influence on the contributor's kind of business.  For example, agribusiness corporations give more money to Representatives who are members of the House Agriculture committee and to Senators who are members of the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry committee.  Similarly, banks and credit unions give more money to members of the House Financial Services committee and the Senate Finance committee.  Many kinds of corporations give money to members of the House Energy and Commerce committee and the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation committee because these powerful committees write laws that regulate many kinds of businesses.  Clearly the amount of money given to each Congressman is heavily dependent on which committees he or she is on.

Each committee is headed by a chairman.  These committee chairmen have tremendous amounts of control over the bills written in that committee.  As a result, committee chairmen receive much more money in campaign contributions compared to other members of the same committee, and especially compared to average Congressmen.  How much more?  In the 2004 election cycle the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce committee, Representative Joe Barton, received about four times as much money as each of the other members on the same committee (excluding the second-ranked member).  In specific numbers, just counting the money received from Barton's top five industry categories (as reported at the OpenSecrets.org website), Barton received $896,775 — close to one million dollars.

The influence of campaign contributions occurs most significantly in committees.  By comparison, the voting that takes place in the Senate chamber and the chamber of the House of Representatives basically just blocks the most offensive and unpopular bills.  The other bills, which contain a combination of benefits for both voters and campaign contributors, get passed and, if they are signed by the President, become laws.

Where Does The Money Go?  Advertising!

Why is it so important for politicians to raise so much money?  The most expensive aspect of a political campaign is advertising.  The purpose of this advertising is to convince voters to vote for a specific candidate.  Does advertising work?  Definitely! Paid political advertisements are especially effective when they are designed by knowledgeable media consultants.

Advertising is especially influential in primary elections.  Consider that in a general election relatively few people are undecided about choosing between a Republican candidate and a Democratic candidate.  But in a primary election a Republican voter can more easily be persuaded to switch allegiance from one Republican candidate to another Republican candidate.  Similarly, a Democratic voter can more easily be persuaded to switch allegiance from one Democratic candidate to another Democratic candidate.  In other words, voters are less biased and more vulnerable to the influence of political advertisements when their choices are all from their preferred political party.

An interesting example of advertising influencing a primary election occurred when a Democratic governor in California was running for reelection.  As usually occurs for incumbents, he had no real competition in the Democratic primary.  His biggest concern was the possibility of competing against a strong Republican candidate in the general election.  To prevent this situation the Governor's campaign team paid for political advertisements that criticized the strongest candidates in the Republican primary.  The result was that a weaker candidate won the Republican primary, and this made it easier for the Governor to win the general election.  This example demonstrates that advertising strategies can be complex.

Unfortunately for voters, advertising intentionally avoids revealing a candidate's position on the issues that voters care about the most.  Political advertisements in favor of a candidate usually focus on conveying generalized positive characteristics such as leadership, decisiveness, popularity, and effectiveness.  Expressing the candidate's position on a controversial issue is avoided because that tends to alienate more voters than it attracts.  The most effective political advertisements focus on criticizing opposing candidates in terms of character flaws and past voting records, both of which are easy to distort.  Why is negative advertising so effective?  Because there is a basic human tendency for people to be slow and cautious about increasing their regard for someone based on positive information, whereas people are quick to lose their regard for someone based on negative information.

On a small scale, political advertising takes the form of lawn signs, billboards, newspaper advertisements, and printed material delivered by mail.  This kind of advertising is especially appropriate for politicians running for a local office, such as a seat on the city council or the job of county Sheriff.  Politicians who run for Governor, U.S. Senator, or U.S. President must reach many more voters, so they heavily depend on television advertising.

Television advertisements are especially effective because people react more strongly to visual images than to words, either spoken or printed.  Unfortunately for candidates, television advertising is tremendously expensive.  In fact, most of the money raised for Congressional and Presidential elections is used to pay for television advertising.

Another form of advertising occurs as a result of politicians holding rallies.  Although part of the purpose of a rally is to increase the enthusiasm of supporters, the more important purpose of a public rally is to get free media attention.  In other words, money is used to promote the rally and make it look impressive so that television and newspaper reporters will report on the rally as a news event.  Although the news coverage is free, lots of money has to be spent to get that free coverage.

Some people complain that third-party candidates don't receive adequate television news and newspaper attention.  For example, in the year 2000 Presidential election, news media had relatively few reports about third-party candidate Ralph Nader.  One of the reasons for this neglect is that third-party candidates don't spend much money buying time for television advertisements and space for newspaper advertisements.  Naturally television networks and newspaper businesses prefer to give free advertising — in the form of news coverage — to Republican and Democratic candidates because these are the candidates who buy the most advertising.

The cost of paid political advertisements is often the biggest expense in an election campaign.  This expense can't be avoided because political advertisements are so effective.  To put it bluntly, a politician who runs for an important office such as Governor, Congressman, or President cannot win without lots of paid political advertisements, especially on television.

Biased News

Can money be used to bias the news?  Yes.

The most direct approach for influencing news media is for corporations and wealthy individuals to buy television stations or networks, radio stations or networks, newspapers, and magazines.  This approach allows the media owners to bias the news in whatever way they wish.

As examples of media ownership, the ABC television network is owned by Disney Corporation, NBC television is owned by General Electric Corporation, and CBS is owned by Viacom.  How does this ownership bias the news?  ABC news reporters never produce investigative reports about the Disney Corporation, NBC news reporters would never say anything negative about General Electric, and CBS news reporters would never be critical of activities by Viacom's other businesses, which include Blockbuster and Paramount Pictures.  In addition, each television network also avoids saying anything negative about the parent corporation of another network.  Why?  So the corporate owner of a competing network won't use the same tactic to get revenge.

Some news media are owned by people who strongly favor one political party or the other, and it's normal for the owners to use their political influence.  Here is an example.  A few weeks before a major election, The Oregonian newspaper in Oregon received statements from several women claiming that a married U.S. Senator from Oregon, Bob Packwood, had sexual relations with them when they were under the influence of alcohol.  The newspaper owners favored the Republican party and the Senator was a Republican, so the newspaper delayed publishing an article on the subject until the day after the Senator was reelected.  Although accusations do not by themselves imply guilt, the accusations in this case were well-founded, the Senator was disgraced, and at the end of his six-year term he chose not to run for reelection.

As this example shows, a favorite tactic for biasing news sources is to adjust the timing of a news story.  This tactic includes reporting a story on the same day that lots of other newsworthy events occur so that the story fails to appear on the front page of a newspaper.

A more obvious tactic for biasing the news is to fail to report a story at all.  Surprisingly this happens for even some important news.  To call attention to this tactic and call attention to under-reported stories, a professor and students at Sonoma State University in California created Project Censored which each year announces what they regard as the 25 most under-reported stories of the year.  Since then, other groups and individuals have created their own versions of under-reported stories.  Of course the choice of stories tends to reflect the political bias of the people choosing the stories.

Some people claim that there is competition in the news-media business and this competition ensures that news media remains unbiased.  If this perspective were correct, there would be diversity in who owns various television and radio stations.  However, five years after antitrust regulations removed restrictions about the ownership of radio stations, two companies owned 1,400 radio stations, whereas previously these stations had been owned by 115 companies.  The resulting absence of diversity in the ownership of news sources results in less competition and greater control over what citizens hear about current events.

Part of the reason for the lack of diversity in news-media ownership is that radio stations, newspapers, and book-publishing businesses are not very profitable.  This minimal profitability is passed on to employees working in these businesses.  The appeal of getting to talk on the radio, pursuing breaking news, and being surrounded by books is what attracts employees to media businesses in spite of the relatively low income.  In a similar way, wealthy individuals and corporations often choose to buy radio stations, newspapers, and book-publishing businesses for reasons of influencing citizens and consumers rather than for being profitable investments.

Most of the funding for television, radio, and newspaper news comes from paid advertisements.  Therefore news editors try to avoid presenting news in ways that would have a negative impact on the businesses that heavily advertise in that media.  As a result there is a slight news bias in favor of whichever businesses provide the most advertising income.  Examples of this influence include newspapers avoiding stories that seriously criticize grocery stores, radio stations avoiding scandalous stories about automobile dealers, and television stations avoiding stories that negatively reflect on automobile manufacturers.

Even when there is no financial relationship between media and a business, influences still occur.  Consider the pharmaceutical industry.  Pharmaceutical corporations often provide funding for non-profit research organizations to do research regarding medications that are manufactured by these corporations.  Typically the people in the research organizations are at least slightly biased in favor of the usefulness of the medications.  Even if they aren't, the corporation usually chooses which other drugs to use in the comparison, and perhaps the dosage amounts.  If the preliminary research results are not favorable, the corporation abandons the study.  When the research results are favorable, the organization creates a press release for the news media and the result becomes a news story.  The consequence is that the effectiveness or safety of a product or technology is essentially promoted through a news story.  The biased information receives extra credibility because viewers, listeners, and readers trust news stories far more than paid advertisements.  Notice that with this approach the news reporting is not biased, yet the news is biased.

A related approach is to provide funding for think tanks.  The stated goal of a think tank is to provide an environment in which clear, independent thinking can be done about a particular subject.  However, think tanks are usually supported by funds from sources that have a specific political agenda.  For example, coal and oil companies and automobile manufacturers fund think tanks that — surprise! — produce supposedly scientific studies that claim that increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere do not cause global warming.  What makes the studies sound less biased is that the think tanks are often given misleading names, such as the Greening Earth Society in the case of a think tank funded by the coal, oil, and auto industry.

Another variation of this general approach is for an industry or large corporation to provide financial support for a citizens group that favors a particular government decision.  The hypothetical organization named Citizens for Superior Foods that was introduced earlier in this chapter is an example of this kind of organization.  Such an organization pretends — especially in its name — to be a grassroots organization, which means it is supposedly citizen-supported.

A well-known example of a citizens group is the National Rifle Association, which is better known as the NRA.  This organization is heavily funded by businesses that manufacture and sell firearms.  However, the NRA portrays itself in terms of its members who are gun and rifle owners.  These non-business members do contribute money to the NRA, but in amounts that pale in comparison to contributions from members who are also owners or employees of firearms-based businesses.  Collaborations between average citizens and businesses, such as the NRA, are not illegal or even unethical or unfair.  However, the funding sources are seldom mentioned by the media when the organization is mentioned.  The result is that when a business-supported citizens group favors a political issue, the popularity of the issue is distorted by the extra funding.

News editors have learned various techniques for subtly biasing viewers and readers.  In defense, politicians have learned how to avoid being a victim of the techniques.  For example, politicians no longer bend down to shake hands with a child because photographs looking down at a candidate make the candidate seem weaker.  As another example, successful politicians learn to speak in entertaining sound bites, and avoid long sentences that could be taken out of context, because concise statements are the ones that make it into the news.

The ways in which news media can influence voters are endless.  Also they are extremely effective because viewers and readers forget that broadcast and published news can be true and yet also biased.

Do Campaign Contributions Really Change Politician's Decisions?

It is rare for a politician to be elected to a high-level office without first passing through lower-level offices.  By the time a politician rises through the ranks from city councilor to city Mayor to state representative to U.S. Representative to the Chairman of a powerful Congressional committee, and becomes a Senator or even a President, campaign contributors have carefully monitored the politician's biases and agendas.  Based on this information, major campaign contributors focus their contributions on politicians who share their agendas, or on politicians who at least are receptive to their agendas.  In contrast, politicians who are not receptive to the agendas of at least some big campaign contributors cannot reach high-level offices.  Clearly the politicians who get elected are the ones whose voting record the biggest campaign contributors like.

As a result of this selection process many Congressmen and Presidents can honestly claim they are not changing their mind about political matters based on campaign contributions.  Their opinions were established many years earlier.  They are rewarded for these opinions.

Thanks For The Money, But I'm Not Changing My Decision

Let's get back to following Clif Clifford.  Suppose he wins the seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, and Lester Seedum visits him.  If Clif says, Thanks for the money, but I think consumers should be allowed to know whether they are buying genetically modified food, so I won't vote for the exclusion you want, what would happen?

For one thing, Lester would ask other members of the House of Representatives — who Lester has also given money to — not to invite Clif to become a member of any key committee.  Without participation in key committees, a Congressman can only vote yes or no on important bills that already have been heavily influenced by the people on the committees.  This filtering ensures that powerful committee members are fully infected with cashus influentious.

Another consequence of a politician thumbing their nose at a lobbyist is that the organizations behind the lobbyist won't contribute as much money to the politician's reelection campaign.  In the meantime, a Representative in Congress cannot accomplish much during only two years in office — especially when they have no influence in important committees.  Joining a committee, not to mention rising to power within the committee, requires many years of being reelected.  In other words, independent thinking leads to political suicide.

If an issue is a significant part of the agenda of the politician's political party, there is another consequence of betrayal.  Party leaders will learn of the party betrayal through Congressional voting records or reports to the party by the betrayed lobbyist.  There are even Congressional members who are, appropriately, named Whips whose job it is to make sure that Congressmen in their political party vote in the ways the party wants them to vote.  For the remainder of the politician's term, the Whip and other Congressmen are likely to use peer pressure to get the politician to conform to the party's agenda — as determined by party leaders, who are under the influence of campaign contributions.

The final consequence of not cooperating with a lobbyist or party leader occurs at the next election.  The lobbyist is likely to give financial support to the politician's opponents — in both the primary and general elections.  If the politician votes against party leaders, the party leaders will choose not to give money to reelect that politician, and they will give financial support to a more party-minded candidate in the primary election.  Party funds are such a big share of funding that the loss of party funds commonly leads to losing the next election.

Suppose that somehow voters were able to get a pro-voter politician into a position of power, such as becoming chairman of an important committee, so that the politician could write a bill that would accomplish what most voters would like.  Such a bill would be defeated by the majority of Congressmen who are under the influence of campaign contributors.

Even a U.S. President cannot succeed in passing legislation that a majority of voters want if it conflicts with the desires of the biggest campaign contributors.  Such legislation would be blocked by Congressmen responding to the wishes of rich special interests.

As an example of such an effort, President Bill Clinton attempted to implement a reform of health-care laws that was favored by a majority of voters.  The financial influence of health insurance companies, doctors represented by the American Medical Association, pharmaceutical companies, and other health-related professionals and businesses, succeeded in convincing members of Congress to water down the laws in ways that were acceptable to the health-care industry.  The result did not accomplish as much as the President and voters had hoped for.  In particular, there continue to be many people who can't obtain health insurance, even when they are willing to pay higher insurance premiums.  Alas, bold desires for reform typically dwindle to nothing.  (Update: A recently passed law is reforming health insurance, but in ways that force healthy individuals to pay extra money that covers the unhealthy individuals who previously could not get insurance.)

Most politicians in Congress become infected with cashus influentious long before they even run for election to Congress.  At best, uninfected politicians keep a low profile and look for opportunities to champion one or two carefully chosen, voter-supported causes.

More Ethical Politicians Would Be Nice, But Not Sufficient

Voters are often inspired when a politician seems to have the voter's best interests at heart, and then later the voters are disillusioned when the politician is found to have lied, been involved in a sexual scandal, or been involved in corruption.  Unfortunately this desire for a high standard of ethics in politicians conflicts with the motivations of a politician.

What motivates