Spot on with your observations.Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1 (1976), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States struck down several provisions in the 1974 Amendment to a law that limited campaign expenditures, independent expenditures by individuals and groups, and expenditures by a candidate from personal funds. It introduced the idea that money counts as speech, and eliminated any previous restraints on unlimited spending in US election campaigns. The Court upheld the provision which sets limits on individuals' campaign contributions.
First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U.S. 765 (1978 ), was a case, decided in 1978, in which the United States Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that corporations had a First Amendment right to make contributions in order to attempt to influence political processes. In his opinion, Justice Lewis Powell ruled that a Massachusetts criminal statute prohibiting the expenditure of corporate funds for "influencing or affecting" voters' opinions infringed on corporations' "protected speech in a manner unjustified by a compelling state interest" as he put it. It was heavily cited in the majority opinion of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310 (2010).
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. (2010), (Docket No. 08-205), is a US constitutional law case, in which the United States Supreme Court held that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting political independent expenditures by corporations, associations, or labor unions. The conservative lobbying group Citizens United wanted to air a film critical of Hillary Clinton and to advertise the film during television broadcasts in apparent violation of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (commonly known as the McCain–Feingold Act or "BCRA").[2] In a 5–4 decision, the Court held that portions of BCRA §203 violated the First Amendment.
McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, 572 U.S. (2014), was a campaign finance case before the United States Supreme Court challenging Section 441 of the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA), which instates the biennial aggregate limit that individuals can contribute to national party and federal candidate committees.
The case was argued before the Supreme Court on October 8, 2013, being brought on appeal after the United States District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the challenge. It was decided on April 2, 2014,[3] reversing the decision below and remanding. Justices Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, and Alito concluded that the First Amendment invalidates aggregate contribution limits, while Thomas decried all contribution limits.
So they designed the law in the 1970's to allow legal bribery of publicly elected officials, immediately after the rules were set the income inequality gap began to widen. It was reinforced with Citizens United in 2010 and again last week with McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. Our Supreme Court is pretty clearly in favor of corporate America, as is evident by their voting records.
The only way to stop this bullshit from continuously happening is to enact an amendment to the constitution, get money out of politics
Right now, there is no such thing as Democracy in America. Our elections are fraudulent and bought and paid for by corporations with their own interests
http://www.wolf-pac.com/
I would add that some forms of deficit spending are also partially responsible, as it allows governments to sidestep the people and to take actions without the approval of the people, often detrimental to their interests.
The government serves the people and should come hat in hand, proving it's case for any spending needs.
It should not be able to circumvent this basic responsibility.
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