Who Owns Your Political Party?

 

Some people act as if the Democrat Party and the Republican Party are somehow America’s de facto “official” parties and behave as if they’re an actual part of the government. One senses that to contradict that is somehow unpatriotic. The plain truth of the matter is that they are private corporations. Their internal party leadership, which these days are primarily the large corporate donors, determine the party platform which the elected candidates follow (note that each party pays for its own caucus).  

However, these days the two parties have come together to form a de facto duopoly under the direction and control of a relatively handful of deep pocket investors. For instance, did you know that in 2024, just 1.05% of U,S, population made 78.45% of all political contributions?

Most of that money isn’t coming from individuals like Koch, Soros, or even Musk. It’s coming from people with names like Yass, Adelson, Uihlien, Mellon, and Griffin. People that most of us have never heard of but with very deep pockets and all of whom having a very specific agenda. It's also coming from well financed political action committees, professional associations, financial fund managers, and corporate donors. Nevertheless, despite being literally “owned” by Wall Street, both parties receive taxpayer subsidies.

Yelp, you read that right. Despite receiving billions from Wall Street, both parties also receive money from taxpayers, irrespective of their political registration, in order to support their primaries. Can you imagine that? If you’re an Independent, like the majority of American voters, or a member of a third party like the Greens, Libertarians, or Constitutionalists, you still are compelled to pay for the Republican and Democrat partisan primary!

So, if you aren’t a member of either party, what do you care about who wins their primary? Well, the fact of the matter is that you likely don’t, and yet your tax dollars are involuntarily taken from you and given to them. To add insult to injury, none of the third parties (and certainly none of the Independent candidates) get a penny in taxpayer subsidies. In fact, they receive little or no money of any consequence from deep pocket corporate donors.

So, before we talk about how much money the two corporate owned parties get from deep pocket donors, let’s talk about Citizens United, the 2010 mistake by the Supreme Court which gave corporations “personhood” and declared that money was “free speech”, except that Big Business was entitled to now openly and freely give what they want while the average citizen was effectively locked out of politics.

As I said, Citizens United occurred in 2010 (Citizens United vs. FEC). Before that, corporations and their political action committees (“PACs”) had to go through a series of Byzantine steps to donate to candidates and parties, and even then, they were restricted in what they could donate. In fact, unions could keep up with most corporations. It was still possible of the average citizen to make a difference financially in elections, especially at the local and state levels.

Of course, the federal level was another matter. Even then, in pre-2010, Congress was largely a “Millionaire’s Club”, and if your weren’t going in, there was a pretty good chance you would be long before you retired. In 2008 for instance, the average cost of running for a seat in the House of Representatives was $1.73 million dollars while a Senate seat might cost you $8.53 million. Fast forward to 2012, just two years after Citizens United went into effect, that House seat would cost you an average of $1.57 million dollars, and that Senate seat would set you back a hefty $11.47 million.

By 2018, you were going to pay over $2 million for a seat in the House and $15.75 million for that Senate seat. In 2022, you’d pay an average of $2.79 million dollars for a job that paid about 170,000 a year. That Senate seat, which paid the same as the House, would cost you $26.53 million dollars. Prior to 2010, corporations and unions gave almost the same amount. Nowadays, it’s a 10:1 ratio in favor of Wall Street.

By the end of the 2022 election cycle, the average winner (which were nearly all incumbents) spent $26.5 million for the Senate seat and $2.8 million for their House seat. As an aside, the average loser for a House seat spent $803,773 while in the Senate, the average loser dropped $13,518,918.

Of course, winner or loser, most of this money was coming from Corporate America and you can bet they weren’t just trying to be “good” or “responsible” corporate citizens. This was investment dollars, and with all investments, you expect to get something back for your money.

So, if both parties---the Democrats and Republicans---are private corporations, and if they are funded by Wall Street, why are taxpayers required to help underwrite their primaries through their tax dollars? Lets look at this question another way. Taxpayer funding of primaries are the result of legislation at the state level. Who makes up state legislatures? Despite, being minority parties, most legislatures are comprised of Democrats and Republicans.

How is it then, with both parties being the minority (Democrats make up about 27% of all registered voters nationally while Republicans make up about 26%). Independents, however, comprise about 43%. In addition, the number of registered Democrats and Republicans has been dropping for years while the number of “Indies” has been booming.

Thanks to having a rigged electoral system (which if freely admitted by both parties), they are about to make it very difficult for any third party or non-partisan candidate to get on the ballot. First, partisan candidates typically need only three to five signatures to get on the ballot whereas third party candidates may need ten times that amount for the same office.

In some cases, they may be required to hundreds or thousands of signatures by petition, and you can bet that both parties will work together to eliminate as many of those signatures as being “invalid” as possible (often waiting as close to the filing deadline as possible to prevent them from getting additional signatures).

In Indiana for instance, an Independent needs to get 36,944 signatures to get on the ballot for a statewide election. In Texas, a third party candidate needs 81,000 signatures gathered over a 75 day period. In New York, it’s 45,000. Partisan candidates, however, generally only need three to five signatures. 

This is often called the "2% rule" where candidates other than a Democrat or Republican must get 2% of registered voters to sign a petition just to get on the ballot. Bear in mind too that only the two parties get automatic ballot access. Free and fair elections? Hardly.

Partisan gerrymandering of districts (which the Supreme Court has refused to rule on) is another way to keep voters from being represented. Districts are aligned to ensure that the presiding party will keep registered voters from that party in the majority in that district. The result is that 97% of incumbents are automatically reelected.

Lastly, money. No campaign can be run without money, and lots of it. Since both parties are in bed with Wall Street and some very wealthy donors, very little money goes to anyone else aside from the pre-approved partisan candidates. Of course, the corporate owned media does its party to ignore or belittle any third party or Indie candidate, treating them as if they were a sideshow amid claims of “wasting your vote” or “throwing away your vote”.

In addition, both state parties ensure that their party’s primary remains closed. That is, unless you’re a member of their clique, you can’t play in their sandbox. However, since the legislation doesn’t allow for any distinction between being a partisan voter or not, everyone is taxed equally to fund their sandbox.

So, that means that in the 13 states and the District of Columbia with closed primaries (which includes Kentucky, Florida, Delaware, New York, and Pennsylvania), some 23.5 million Independents voters and approximately 5.3 million third party voters were not just denied the opportunity to vote, they were forced to pay for those closed partisan primaries thanks to partisan legislation. Sound fair? Remember, that the American Revolution came about over the issue of “taxation without representation”.

It was that fact that the British Parliament was voting on matters without our input and then forcing us to pay for those decisions, again without our approval. Here we have partisan political primaries being conducted by two private corporations, and thanks to legislation passed by partisan legislators which also excluded voters in general, required everyone (to pay for their insider elections yet denying a large segment of voters the opportunity to participate in them!

It would be like two cliques from high school throwing a party that you’re not invited to, but you have to pay for it!  I think this would qualify as “taxation without representation” just as well, don’t you? Our Founding Fathers (who frowned on political parties to begin with) would be up in arms. As an aside, the pre-revolutionary “Sons of Liberty” were well known for tar and feathering tax collectors and others for doing less, not to mention hanging many an official of the Crown in effigy from Boston Common’s “Liberty Tree”.

So, where does that leave us? Interestingly, this demonstrates that we have a duopoly which does not represent the majority of Americans. Not even close. In order to maintain control, it’s necessary to rig the system to ensure that they and only they retain power. That means that each party caters to the extreme wings of their party, which is responsible, at least in part, to the great divide we are experiencing in this country while at the same time brainwashing us into believing they’re trying bridge that divide.

They force, through legislation, citizens to financially support them, giving the impression of popular support. They gerrymander districts to give themselves a near perpetual hold on districts. The absence of term limits allows them to hold office for as long as they want while corporate control over campaign finances virtually guarantees that there’s no serious challenge to the status quo while the media, pretending to be unbiased, ignores or ridicules anyone who has the audacity to resist or demand choice.  Kool-Aide anyone? 

In truth, neither Independents nor third party members actually want to participate in partisan primary elections. The fact they are Independent or member of a third party demonstrates that! What they want is either equal voting access if they’re to be taxed or not taxed and allowed to support their own candidates or party.  Ideally, each party should be fully responsible for funding their own primaries instead state legislatures effectively putting a gun to the head of voters and telling them we have “free and open elections”.   

Nether the Republican Party or the Democratic Party are the “official” parties of the United States. They are merely two of many, and they’re both minority parties at that! They do not have the right to prohibit people from voting or ballot access any more than they have the right to mandate support of their primary unless all primaries are equally supported, at least in my opinion. 

Campaign finance reform, term limits, rank choice voting, equal ballot access, non-partisan gerrymandering and nationwide citizen referendums are seriously required if we’re to have a mediocrem of freedom left for ourselves and future generations. If America is to reclaim the title of "Beacon of Freedom", wouldn't you think we should start with our own electoral process first?    

 

Thank you for reading "Another Opinion", the Op/Ed blog page for the "militant middle".  Here at "A/O" we truly value our readers. At A/O we seek the facts as they exist, not partisan talking points.  We hope you find our articles informative and engaging. Comments are welcome, provided they are not vulgar, insulting or demeaning.  Another Opinion is offered without charge and is directed toward all independent and free-thinking individuals. We ask, however, that you "like" us on whatever platform you found us on in order to keep our articles available for free to others. Lastly, in order to keep costs down, we depend on passive marketing, and therefore, depend on our readers to please forward our posts along. Below you will find links to the sources we used in writing this article. Thank you. 

 

Election Trends

Corporatism

Taxpayer Funding: The Cost of Closed Primaries

Closed Primary States 2025

Closed Primary

Research Brief: Growing Cohort of Independent Voters BecomesCritical Segment of Electorate

Voters Who Identify As Independent Skyrockets As Democrats and Republicans Dwindle

How US states make it tough for third parties in elections

10 Ways to Fight the Corporatocracy

Is the United States Undergoing a Marxist Revolution?

Recently, I had a reader ask me if the U.S. was surreptitiously becoming a "Marxist" country. The reader pointed to presence of  Left wing groups like Antifa. LGBTQ, and Black Lives Matter (which have gone quiet lately) and the hesitance of government officials (especially Democrats) to act, not to mention the politicization for the Justice Department and law enforcement agencies such as the FBI. They also wondered if the comically misnamed "January 6th Insurrection" was part of it, perhaps a "false flag" designed to rally the Left and shine the spotlight on Right winger agitators and leaders.

While there's no doubt the protest of January 6th was out of years of pent-up frustration, triggered by what many saw as a "stolen election", it was by no means a "false flag". It was genuine anger, and as the last four years has borne out, a justifiable anger.  The Biden Administration hasn't done America any favors domestically or overseas. So, is America on the road to Marxism? Here's my response. I hope you find it informative.

Is the U.S. becoming Marxist? Hardly. In fact, we’re aren't in the midst of a revolution of any sort (at least, not yet).  However, the United States is and has been undergoing a corporate coup in slow motion for some time now. Wall Street has been growing its power and influence over politics in the U.S. ever since the “Citizens United” blunder in 2010 by the Supreme Court, which effectively removed the ordinary citizen voter from any meaningful impact on elections.

Citizens United declared that corporations, which are nothing more than legal fictions, have the same rights as you and I while employees are denied many of the basic rights they have outside of the business. It means that not only does the artificial entity itself have a voice in a election, but so to does the individuals who control the company. In addition, the Supreme Court blunder said that money is equivalent to free speech.

It also said corporations can donate what they please while we’re still capped in what we can donate, not that it matters. Corporations can give millions which far exceeds anything the average citizen voter can ever hope to give. These corporations even donate more than unions by a 10 to 1 margin.

Thus, corporations can buy the candidate of their choice. They also underwrite the two principal parties, the Democrats and Republicans (what in truth we have is simply two competing corporate cliques with many corporations giving to both parties). They also fund so-called “leadership PACs” which are basically slush funds for politicians to use as they please.

There are literally hundreds of lobbyists per legislator (who often call on the senior staff as well). How many lobbyists represent “Joe and Jane Public? you ask? Virtually none, and what does exist can’t come close to matching what Wall Street gives.

In addition, because politicians don’t have the time or staff to read every bill coming across their desk, corporate lobbying firms do have the time and staff to reading incoming bills, as well as provide summaries and recommendations on how to vote. On many occasions, this is done strictly for the party leadership, who then pass their marching orders down the line. As an aside, legislators typically spend the majority of their day fund raising for the party and party leadership as well as themselves.

Corporate lobbyists help legislators to research and/or write bills (and have been known to write the bills in their entirety) and then help shepherd them through the maze of committees (albeit often quietly picking up some "riders' (better known as “pork”) along the way.

Now, if that’s not enough, corporate lobbyists provide all sorts of perks, ranging from the use of private planes, boats, beach houses, “investment advice”, and vacations (typically under the heading of a “seminar” or something educational). In addition, the majority of legislators leaving office find themselves working for one or more of these lobbyist firms and/or Wall Street corporations making ten times what they did in Washington (many under the moniker of <wink wink> “consultant”).

Just five corporations now control 96+% of all media—-print, electronic, internet, television and radio. They determine what you hear and see (until recently it was six). They decide what you should know and how it’s to be presented. They also entertain you with regular programming (some with a political slant and some not), sports, video games, talk shows, magazines, and so forth. Some of it is obvious but most of it isn’t. It’s barely noticeable and subtle. Bread and circuses made new.

So, does any of that sound like “Marxism” to you? Most political scientists agree that the United States is nowadays a neo-fascist Oligarchy. The debate has become over which term best describes the nature of our servitude --- a “plutocracy”, "oligarchy", or “kleptocracy”, but does it matter? The end result is the same. We've ceased being citizens. National pride is passé, even frowned upon. Nowadays, we are global consumers loyal to some soap or deodorant. 

America is no longer a Republic, although the illusion will continue to be perpetuated for a bit longer just as it was under the early Roman Caesars shortly after the fall of the Roman Republic. The Caesars offered security and economic stability in exchange for power, wealth, and the freedom of the Roman people. 

The United States has become a corporatocracy through a process known as "gradualism"; shot incremental steps which, while appearing to go backwards here and there, steadily advances elsewhere. Sometimes it makes giant bold moves while at other times its movements through the halls of government are so subtle as to be barely noticeable.   

We've devolved into a surveillance state where privacy has become a quaint notion of a bygone age, where democracy is parceled out, and our freedoms are managed for our own good. Any government which has taken upon itself the power to a lot you any measure of freedom can just as easily take that freedom away without civil recourse. Government should serve the people, not serve them up on a platter. 

There are literally dozens of books, articles and videos about our metamorphosis from a democratic Constitutional Republic into “USA Inc”. I’ve provided just a sprinkling of links below to whet your curiosity. I do hope you will check them out.

 

Thank you for reading "Another Opinion", the Op/Ed blog page for the "militant middle".  Here at "A/O" we truly value our readers. At A/O we seek the facts as they exist, not partisan talking points.  We hope you found our articles informative and engaging. Comments are welcome, provided they are not vulgar, insulting or demeaning.  Another Opinion is offered without charge and is directed toward all independent and free thinking individuals. We do ask, however, that you "like" us on whatever site you found us on, and that you please pass our post along. Below you will find links to the sources we used in writing this article. Thank you. 

The Media Oligopoly: How a Handful of Companies Control Nearly All of the Media in the U.S.

The Myth of U.S. Democracy and the Reality of U.S. Corporatocracy

The Corporate Takeover of American Politics

How the US Became an Oligarchy

The American Oligarchs Have Arrived to Destroy US Democracy | Common Dreams

 

It's Time For Real Change, But Can It Really Happen?

We need to accept that we're being played. All of us. We've become a nation of victims, alleged racists, and entitled brats. We must find ways to work together, preferably without the government's involvement as much as possible. This shouldn't be difficult since we have more in common than not, although the establishment media would have you believe otherwise.  A divided nation cannot stand for long.

Political offices which don't make laws or policy need to be non-partisan from the outset. Term limits need to be mandatory. Congress and the Presidency should be limited to 12 years. Four 3 year terms for the President; two 6 year terms for the Senate; and six 2 year terms for Representatives. In addition, all federal court positions, including the Supreme Court, should also be capped at 12 years. Citizens United has shown us just how out of touch the Supreme Court is.

We need to push for an end of partisanship. The election playing field should be level. Elections should be open to all individuals regardless of political affiliation. As it is now, Democrats and Republicans are only required to have three or five signatures to get on the ballot. Meanwhile, Independents (the nation's largest political bloc) have to have hundreds of signatures. Same goes for third parties.

Whatever goes for the Democrats and Republicans should go for anyone else running for office. Debates are largely closed to anyone not a Democrat or Republican (particularly at the national level, thanks to the Commission on Presidential Debates, a bipartisan effort to rig the debates and keep out third parties and Independents). That needs to go. We need to hear from all candidates, not just a chosen two.

There needs to be total campaign finance reform, which includes eliminating the Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United mistake. Corporations are not "people".  They are legal fictions. They are not entitled to the same (or greater) rights as you and me. They do not speak for their employees, customers, or shareholders (who each speak for themselves with their own vote and actions).

The Supreme Court declared in their decision that money was equivalent to free speech, except corporations had more "free speech" than you and I because there was no cap on what they could spin. Thus  their "free speech" was more valuable than that of ordinary citizens. 

Citizens United all but removed citizens from the election process by making it so expensive that common voters can't either compete with corporate donations or afford to run for office. No wonder Congress is referred to as a "millionaire's club", and the cost to run for a state and local office isn't that far off (the same can be said of the Presidency and Judicial system by the way).

What the Supreme Court did through Citizens United was to create a de facto "political class" of wealthy elites, leaving us as the "debt serfs" instead of the "Citizen Representatives" our Founding Fathers intended.

Term limits reduce lessens corporate influence. It also greatly increases the flow of new ideas and creates a closer connection between the voters and the elected. Term limits also reduce the possibilities of corruption. Rank Choice Voting is something we need to seriously consider.  It allows us to rank candidates without reference to a party. Where Rank Choice Voting has been tried, it's been shown to work. The highest ranked candidate wins. It doesn't get any more fair than that.

The public should control the purse strings. If we've learned anything about politics , it's that politicians can't be trusted with money, especially ours! Any proposed increase in taxes, fees, rates, or salaries of public officials, should be placed on the ballot and voted on by the public. It's our money and it should be our decision.

By the same token, citizens should be allowed to put referendums on the ballot. In 26 states plus Washington D.C., that's already a reality. However, in others states (like Kentucky), legislators fear it like the plague. The last thing they want is citizens putting their own issues on the ballot and bypassing them with a direct vote. Why?  I'll tell you what I was told.

As one senior Kentucky "Blue Dog" Democrat state senator once told me, "voters aren't smart enough to know what they what", which I strongly disagree with. I think we know exactly what we want, and I think that given balanced and accurate information on an issue, voters make pretty good decisions. The fear of professional politicians is being bypassed and losing their power and influence.

By the way, that "Blue Dog" Democrat also happened to be drawing two  pensions, one private and one public (we call that "double dipping"). He also sat on two Election and Constitutional Amendment committees as well as host of financial committees.  Think he had a vested interest in opposing voter referendums?

Any referendum would have put on a ballot, be it local or statewide, would be the result of a petition signed by registered voters after first being reviewed by either the County/City attorney general or the State Attorney General to ensure its legality and is properly worded to avoid any ambiguities or misunderstandings. The appropriate attorney general would also provide a public notice of the issue to be voted on that is free from partisan wording and is in easy to understand language.

If Citizens United can be viewed as "free speech" for corporations and the wealthy, then term limits, citizen ballot initiatives, and voter control of the purse strings are too! By the same token, prohibiting these things can and should be considered stifling the public's free speech.

As soon as a winning candidate is elected to office and immediately before being sworn in, should publically resign from their political party and announce their intention to represent all the citizens of their district.

In our "winner-take-all" political system and thanks to gerrymandering and in the absence of term limits, the winning party controls that seat for the next two, four, or six years (depending on the office). Only legislation which supports their particular point of view is supported.

Meanwhile, those who's candidate or party lost receive nothing or close to it in terms of representation. If you're a Democrat and the Republican wins, you're out of luck when it comes to being represented. Your interests are rarely if ever, considered.  In a "winner-take-all" political system, the losing side is literally without a political voice. Talk about taxation without representation!

Of course, we have to take a deeper look here. Both main parties, the Democrats and Republicans, don't actually represent common voters on the Left, Right, or Middle. They represent the interests of corporate cliques financing either side of the political divide. One might even say that they are above the artificial political divide whose sole aim is to keep us on opposing sides. The last thing they want is us united.

 It's about power to control wealth and wealth to control of power. Their lobbyists quite literally write the legislation which they then shepherd through the various committees with each adding earmarks or "pork" as the price of their signature (as an aside, Congress voted to make "pork" illegal in 2011, although it routinely ignores its own law).

Ultimately if enough (and the right) palms are greased, the bill, written for their benefit, becomes law. Your interests doesn't actually come into play. If it does by pure happenstance, it's immediately heralded as a "victory for the people". Yeah, right.

Nevertheless, hopefully your interests coincide enough with one side or the other to warrant your vote. At least that's what their campaign marketing tries to convince you of anyway. But it doesn't change the fact that the interests of the losing side aren't even seriously considered post election. But, most Americans, over 43% of them, have said "no" to both parties and switched to Independent while others have decided to join a third party.

Personally, I think politicians should renounce their political affiliation and take an oath that they will represent the best interest of all the voters in their district as I stated earlier. Until political parties (defacto extensions of special interest cliques) are eliminated, that's the best and only prospect of all the voters having a voice.

If we want change; really want it, we will have to make it happen. We are the only ones who can. Those in power have historically never willingly surrendered it. They've fought to keep it. They've imposed it. They've camouflaged it. They've traded one hand for the other, but they've never willingly given it up.

Most of us have been convinced by the establishment media that there is nothing we can do, so we sit back and do nothing. Bread and circuses. The truth is that we can do something---term limits, Rank Choice Voting, end gerrymandering, end Citizens United, enact referendums and voter initiatives, equal ballot access, and ending "winner-take-all" elections to name just a few.

We ultimately have the real power through our willingness to express our voice and our vote. We had it all along, but many of us have been intimidated into silence. Our Founding Fathers were too, by the greatest and most powerful empire on the planet, but they found their voice and courage. Now, so can you.

 

 If you want to know more, please take a look at the links below. If you enjoyed the article, please consider passing it along to others and don't forget to subscribe. It's free! Lastly please be sure to "like" us on whatever platform you use to read A/O. It helps with the algorithms and keeps our articles in circulation. Thank you! 

States with initiative or referendum

Blog: A Permanent Ban on Pork Barrel Spending

 

U.S. Term Limits

 

To End Gerrymandering, Change How We Elect Congress

End Gerrymandering

FairVote: Rank Choice Voting

Rank Choice Voting

 

End Citizens United

Understanding the Referendum Process