General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: A thread in support of ousting Third Wayer Rahm Emanuel [View all]dreamnightwind
(4,775 posts)"Many progressives dont get it either. If you put them all on Sodium Pentothal and asked if grass-roots politics can still beat big money, my hunch is theyd say no"
I think we can beat big money, but that it is a social science in its infancy, unlike the social science of manipulation, deprivation and fear, which is far advanced and well-funded by the usual suspects.
Learning to beat big money is, in the end, what it's all about. There's no other way to reform our party or our nation. I have long thought the acceptance of money from these sources could be used against them, to delegitimize any candidate accepting such "donations", and that a well-conceived social networking or just web-based approach would be able to make the stigma stick to the recipients. I still hope it happens. I've seen a few good attempts to do this (C.R.E.W., OpenSecrets, etc.), but so far nothing that gets into the consciousness of enough voters to make the difference. Part of the problem, of course, it that the big-money politicians have to be beaten in the primaries, with a non big-money alternative winning, it makes little difference if the alternatives are also funded by big money.