so a question that has arisen add are we saw a democracy World hacks who actually
as I was use me
because I keep talking about how money has corrupted our politics
and that at the national level we don't really have a functioning democracy
anymore cuz
our politicians aren't listening to us well that's my opinion based on
all the different stories that are covered over last 17 18 years a covering
politics
but now some prison researchers Martin Jones and Benjamin page
actually went back and did a study on this issue
they studied 1,779
different policy initiatives between 1981 and 2000
and to and then they published a
in perspectives on politics were very
the respected journal it's called testing theories of american politics
so let's talk about how they did it they said they then compared those policy
changes
the ones that they study with the express the opinion of the United States
public
comparing the preference for the average american at the 50th percentile be
income
to what those americans are the ninetieth percentile preferred
as well as the opinions major lobbying or business groups
so that is a really interesting way of doing it they take an issue
they see which way to go in the voting right and they say
re: at the time was a public opinion poll on the 50th percentile
and then the top 10 percent and then lobbyists
and and business groups I'm a mob pins and needles I'm reading the beginning of
this story
the see how it turned out well I have bad news for us.
quote the purposes the average American
appear to have only a minuscule
near 0 City sickly
non-significant impact upon public
policy that is devastated
that remember this is before citizens united certainly be former cut should
and remember that we started talking about money in politics and we started
talking about Wolfpack
before citizens united that's because as I've told you on the show many times
the two devastating cases actually came in 1976 and 1978
Buckley be belair where they said money his speech and 78 where they said
corporations have persimmon rights in can spend money in politics
ever since then it has been an evolving
disaster and since then as you can see from the study
over 1800 different policies
and you had almost no effect on that
now this would be generally called and oligarchy
so look for on times at worst or not people don't know what it means I
it so I think it's important to define it policy might define it for you here
and I thought it was good job Summary that to you
an oligarchy is a system where power is effectively wielded by a small number of
individuals
defined by their status called oligarchs members of the oligarchy are the rich
the well-connected and the politically powerful as was particularly well-placed
individuals and institutions like banking
and finance or the military now usually
russia's referred to as up oligarchy and a lot of other countries that are run by
small soda believes
are referred to as an oligarchy but almost never the United States
well it turns out in reality going all the way back to 1981 is when it starts
well we in fact were run by small it's and
I to me it's not damming up all the rich rate
your doctor didn't have anything to do with this Oprah didn't have anything to
do with it
its people who are politically powerful
and actually use that power to their advantage
and to your disadvantage add to that point we go to
a different said a numbers put together by other professors
that recently had news got news to which is very important and let me show you
chart here
%uh how the different percentages did in america
since 1980 and it's always 1980 that it goes back to do so
impacted your more clear on that its 9078 is one all the charts are diverging
and as you can see there you got bottom 20 percent middle 60 percent
and the next 19 percent doing okay they're hanging in there and took to be
fair there actually rising at
tiny bit through those decades but that top line is the top one percent
and they are doing spectacular
let's not an accident that's over decades have time
that shows you a pattern the pattern is
the rules have been fixed in their favor
K now has it gotten better look we have had a democratic president who
lobbied and campaigned on change and he's been in power for five years
in fact as of September 2013
since the Great Recession began in 2008 those five years
the top one percent captured ninety-five percent of all
income gains since the great recession ended
is an amazing number so when they see the economy is recovering
definite s I think it's not recovering for you
its recovery for the top one percent one more devastating fact about that
since September 2013 the 99 percent
so on net 12 percent drop
to their income so sense that's
meeting the time between the green when the Great Recession started in
2008 to September 2013
so unlike their earlier chart from decades ago it's now gotten so bad
perhaps because I'm citizens united adding fuel to that fire
putting them money in politics on steroids is now gotten to the point
even when the economy recovers actually ninety-nine percent of us
still lose our income is no longer going up
incrementally or a tiny bit it's now going down
and after Citizens United then we just recently got the country
which lives even more limits on campaign financing
look it's not a small little issue
campaign finance reform its not like all well look I have strong feelings about
war which makes sense or I have strong feelings about the environment which
makes sense
this is about our democracy so your opinions on war taxes
all that stuff is you relevant if you don't live in a democracy
if you live in an oligarchy don't give a damn about your opinions on those issues
anyway there's only one issue
who controls our politicians and if you do private financing
elections you'll have the people who give those large donations
who control our politicians that is obvious it's a matter of logic
and now through this study it's a matter of fact
one more set have devastating graphs for you
from personable the study's conclusion our democracy just to be clear
is america's claims to being a democratic society
are seriously threatened now
up I tend to think that they are understating that
I think at the National applied at the state level at local
because I've seen a Marx who work there but at the national level
when you talk about Washington DC it is not seriously threatened
its gone it's over I mean look we just saw the numbers
but I'll give you more as I said here the graphs average citizens preferences
how much did affect policy
the line is we have to concern yourself with their okay
well that's what they're talking about when they say your
opinion is insignificant it did not make
any difference flat sorry
not interested alright well upon lies in that way you might say okay well this is
fair
let's take a look at the line for economic elites preferences
yeah that's a different light that's the line that says
it was highly correlated to the policy
the policy was connected to what the economic
elites preferred that is not an accident
it is by design and how about interest-group alignments
donors lobbyists special interests
also barry much aligned
we do not run our government there on our government
I know that's really bad news of course I think we can take it back
you wanna know how you go to war dash pack dot com
now why did I start with pack because
I already saw this I saw in every story I covered my sword in
every political article the person with more money the issue the side with more
money
one in every single instance
that's why we start a wolf pack in the first place if you don't get a
constitutional amendment to fix this
we're done for we might as well just bow our heads and say yes they rule us
in accept their fate but I don't accept that fate
throughout American history brave men and women have fought back
and in Wolf Pack we've got high school students we've got people
who are disabled we've got people love every different background race
ethnicity age group you know what they're doing they're calling their
local state representative senators
and they're having a tremendous impact
and when you see democracy works its amazing
when you actually get a representative or senator to care about his
constituents
and introduce legislation to fix things it's the most wonderful thing you've
ever seen
and then you really believe in democracy thank God
it still exists at the state level and we don't need Washington at all to fix
this
its in the US Constitution because the guys who are brave enough in the first
place to give us that democracy
was benjamin franklin said a republic if we can keep it
knew that a day like this would come that's why they put it in Article five
the Constitution that you can get an amendment to the Constitution
without using Washington at all the state's call for convention for specific
amendment
and then the Constitution is above the Supreme Court
it's above congress so american people warring back
in saying we'll look you know what our government thank you very much
will take that back you see what the results are. when you do nothing
join us and see what the results can be when we do something
together wall dash back dot com