What kind of government does the United States have? Any elementary schooler would be able to provide the textbook answer to this question - democracy. Rule by the people. Actually, not really. We are actually a dolloracracy, a government run by the billionaires for the billionaires. Our government, supposedly charged with serving the collective good, focuses on the needs of the top 10%. Our country was founded on the democratic principle of “one person, one vote,” however, through the years, this has shifted to the oligarchic principle of “one dollar, one vote.”
According to a study conducted by the political scientists Benjamin Page and Martin Gilens, ordinary citizens do not have substantial influence over policy decisions, but rather, …show more content…
To make elections more accessible for the common man, the United States should also expand and improve public media, and with that, free and equal airtime for all candidates. A study found that “...those in democratic nations with well funded and prominent nonprofit and noncommercial broadcasting systems, political knowledge tends to be relatively higher than in nations without substantial public broadcasting, and that the information gap between the rich and the working class and poor is much smaller.” The study also found that nations with strong public broadcasting have better campaign …show more content…
However, until money gets taken out of the political arena once and for all, important priorities will continue to get pushed aside. We need to unite and inform the citizens about the dangers of money in the system. We need to demand change. In the words of Martin Luther King Jr., “‘We’ve got to massively confront the power structure’...powerful interests - freed to, in effect, buy elections, unhindered by downsized and diffused media relying on revenue from campaign ads - now set the rules of engagement. Those interests so dominate politics that the quabbling of Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, is a slideshow to the greater plutocracy and plunder.” It doesn’t have to be this
According to a study conducted by the political scientists Benjamin Page and Martin Gilens, ordinary citizens do not have substantial influence over policy decisions, but rather, …show more content…
To make elections more accessible for the common man, the United States should also expand and improve public media, and with that, free and equal airtime for all candidates. A study found that “...those in democratic nations with well funded and prominent nonprofit and noncommercial broadcasting systems, political knowledge tends to be relatively higher than in nations without substantial public broadcasting, and that the information gap between the rich and the working class and poor is much smaller.” The study also found that nations with strong public broadcasting have better campaign …show more content…
However, until money gets taken out of the political arena once and for all, important priorities will continue to get pushed aside. We need to unite and inform the citizens about the dangers of money in the system. We need to demand change. In the words of Martin Luther King Jr., “‘We’ve got to massively confront the power structure’...powerful interests - freed to, in effect, buy elections, unhindered by downsized and diffused media relying on revenue from campaign ads - now set the rules of engagement. Those interests so dominate politics that the quabbling of Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, is a slideshow to the greater plutocracy and plunder.” It doesn’t have to be this