On an unofficial Occupy Wall Street website, occupywallst.org, there is a "Proposed List of Demands."
One of these demands calls for Congress to "reverse the effects of the Citizens United Supreme Court Decision." Various signs around the "Occupy" movement have called for getting money out of politics.
Many campaign-finance- reform activists were very upset by the 2010 Citizens United decision, which allowed corporations to spend an unlimited amount of funds on "independent expenditures," which usually come in the form of television advertisements not directly connected to a particular campaign or candidate.
The basis of the entire campaign finance debate could be summed up by the question: Should there be limits on how much money individuals and corporations can give to political campaigns?
Of course, there is still a ban on corporations giving directly to campaigns, but some think that allowing corporations to spend these so-called "independent expenditures" goes too far.
However, the question that we should really be asking is: "Why do businesses give to political candidates in the first place?"
To cynics, the answer is simple: to buy elections. But, again, why would a business want to "buy" an election in the first place?
The truth is that the cause of our problems does not stem from corporations participating in the political process. Campaign finance reform advocates are really only attempting to treat the symptoms of an even larger disease: corporatism.
Corporatism is the attempt to manage and guide a nation's economy through the systematic cooperation of government and business. In the 1930s and 1940s, corporatism emerged as the system of central planning in fascist Italy.
Surely this cannot describe the U.S., right?
Think of all of the subsidies to energy companies, subsidies to agriculture, tax loopholes, tax incentives and protective regulations, which usually go to the biggest companies in the U.S.
Corporations naturally want to make sure their names end up on the latest list of "special favors," so they do everything they can to influence election outcomes.
There is no malicious intent behind these actions. The corporations want to make sure they are on the right side of whatever new bill is being proposed.
The actors within government truly believe they are doing what is best for the nation when they collude with the private sector.
The collapse of 2008 proved otherwise.
The real answer to getting corporations out of the business of "buying" government officials is getting the government out of the business of running the economy.
