
Do We Sell Out . . . Again?
The 2024 presidential election is coming up fast, and we’ve got votes for sale. You didn’t know? That’s because you won’t be getting the money. But that’s your vote on the block, along with your head.
According to surveys, no matter who is running, the candidate spending the most money generally wins.1 That gives the Deep Pockets a clear shot to getting their favorites into office simply by pouring millions of dollars into their campaigns. And that’s what they do. Rather than grumble about it, we must keep in mind that it works because we, the masses, vote the way they bait us to. And it’s all terribly legal.2
We can gorge on media with a clear conscience. We are only informing ourselves, are we not? An honorable endeavor.
A presidential campaign is the time in our lives when we become the cynosure of the rich and powerful. During those hectic months, we are elevated as the critical factor in choosing the next Caesar. We’re suddenly in demand, the vortex at which volleys of extravagant ads and social media messages are blasted. We love it. Finally, we can gorge on media with a clear conscience. We are only informing ourselves, are we not? An honorable endeavor.
Of special importance are the undecided voters, a sliver of the electorate that can, it is said, decide an election. Their uncertainty precipitates manic media activity. Their doubts are discussed. They are interviewed. Endless predictions are published based on ongoing analyses of why they just don’t know. The economy and immigration — topics of which they have no clue — are suddenly serious concerns of theirs. A spot in the national limelight is a nice place to be. It could be tempting to continue not knowing for as long as the limelight lasts.
With election day upon us at last, we vote, and it’s over, and we are discreetly lowered back down into the vat of insignificance from which the election campaign dredged us. And guess what? Our vote — our deeply considered, cherished vote — went to the highest bidder. Again. How could that be?
Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), a popular elected official and rare outspoken critic of Israel’s assault on Gaza, lost his 2024 primary to Democrat George Latimer. Perhaps coincidentally AIPAC3 had invested $14.5 million to defeat him,4 airing TV ads that exposed his reprehensible handling of local issues like infrastructure spending. After Bowman’s upset, AIPAC called it “a major victory for the Democratic mainstream that stands with the Jewish state,” adding AIPAC “will continue to support leaders who promote our partnership with Israel.”5 Apparently, the flaw wasn’t Bowman’s handling of infrastructure spending after all.
“Organized people beat organized money,” Cori Bush declared, “and our community is ready to show that St. Louis is not for sale.” She spoke too soon.
Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), also critical of Israel’s handling of Gaza, was targeted by AIPAC as well, who declared it would spend millions to defeat her in her August 2024 primary. “Unfortunately for them,” Bush declared, “organized people beat organized money, and our community is ready to show that St. Louis is not for sale.”
She spoke too soon. United Democracy Project, AIPAC’s super PAC, spent the promised millions — $9 million — to defeat her, and defeat her they did. The conclusion forced on us is that organized money does beat organized people and communities are indeed for sale. But we know communities aren’t for sale. It’s the voters in those communities, ourselves, who are.
Although we elect them because we expect them to know better, members of Congress are as vulnerable to special attention as we are. “When an organization lobbies Congress for support on making public policy, one of the most effective means of achieving victory is by befriending members of Congress through gifts and travel,” Craig Holman of Public Citizen told The Intercept.6 We have caught wind of a similar weakness among our Supreme Court justices.
Their vulnerability is understandable: It is simple venality. They are given money and favors to pass legislation favorable to their sponsors’ businesses. Our vulnerability is not to be excused. Rather than gain anything by voting the way the powerful want us to, we sell ourselves out time after time, losing ground with every vote we squander. Do we not understand this?
Because they need us to elect policy makers friendly to their wishes, the powerful do not shrink from tampering with our autonomy. To win our votes, they have learned they need only hammer certain names and messages into our brains during an intensive, weeks-long media drive immediately before polling day. The process is expensive, but profitable: It yields an electorate that votes as they wish.
Wary must be our watchword. We may have been purchased in the past. It need not be so now or ever again.
We acquiesce to being the target of their bilge, feigning ennui. Ho hum, we think, waiting for it to end, believing we can dispose of the intrusive messages as soon as the images, sound, and verbiage cease. But no. Contaminating residue lingers. Eat a spoonful of Cotton Candy ice cream at three-minute intervals during your evening meal. Interlard breakfast with mouthfuls of sawdust. Skip lunch and binge on potato sticks. Would that affect your body? Your appetite? Your mood? Your mind? You bet.
We cannot filter out incendiary ads flashed at us every few minutes for a period of several weeks. Besides interrupting the continuity of our thinking process, the unbidden messages indeed plant seeds of nonsense in our brains that we, after a time, begin to feed on. We, the American electorate, are not weak. However, our patterns of cognition are known. We cannot help but succumb to such inundation. Well aware of that, the sponsors of those ads smugly invest millions to have their messages flashed at us hundreds of times, knowing it will pay off.
Wary must be our watchword. We may have been purchased in the past. It need not be so now or ever again. We can switch those channels off and turn, for those few crucial weeks, to information whose sources we know, and trust.
While not foolproof, let us make clear neither are we fools. When someone holds a lighted match too close to your face, blow it out.
- Open Secrets is a good place to find out about the positive correlation between campaign spending and election wins at https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/winning-vs-spending?cycle=2024 ↩︎
- The complicated ways in which political contributions can be made and what conditions attach to the different channels has a foul odor about it. The complexity makes it opaque, which makes it suspicious, but it is legal all the same. ↩︎
- American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a pro-Israel lobbying group, has been deemed one of the most powerful lobbying groups. It was assisted in its efforts to defeat Bowman by its super PAC United Democracy Project. ↩︎
- https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/20/nyregion/aipac-bowman-latimer.html ↩︎
- https://www.politico.com/news/2024/06/25/jamaal-bowman-loses-george-latimer-00164997 ↩︎
- https://theintercept.com/2023/11/18/aipac-congress-israel-trips-donors/ ↩︎