Carter on Oligarchy

[kalm]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.

Transcript:

HARTMANN: Our Supreme Court has now said, “unlimited money in politics.” It seems like a violation of principles of democracy. … Your thoughts on that?

CARTER: It violates the essence of what made America a great country in its political system. Now it’s just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president. And the same thing applies to governors and U.S. senators and congress members. So now we’ve just seen a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect and sometimes get favors for themselves after the election’s over. … The incumbents, Democrats and Republicans, look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves. Somebody’s who’s already in Congress has a lot more to sell to an avid contributor than somebody who’s just a challenger.

https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

[GannonFan]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.

Transcript:

HARTMANN: Our Supreme Court has now said, “unlimited money in politics.” It seems like a violation of principles of democracy. … Your thoughts on that?

CARTER: It violates the essence of what made America a great country in its political system. Now it’s just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president. And the same thing applies to governors and U.S. senators and congress members. So now we’ve just seen a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect and sometimes get favors for themselves after the election’s over. … The incumbents, Democrats and Republicans, look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves. Somebody’s who’s already in Congress has a lot more to sell to an avid contributor than somebody who’s just a challenger.

https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

Eh, read some books on Carter, when he was in his prime he was every bit the ruthless and hardcore politician that he seems to be castigating here. Sure, he pushed back against the Kennedy oligarchy that existed before him, but his was just a different kind. Money has always been in politics - he's at least an expert in that because he played the same game. And yes, incumbents have advantages over challengers. And water is wet.

[kalm]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.



https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

Eh, read some books on Carter, when he was in his prime he was every bit the ruthless and hardcore politician that he seems to be castigating here. Sure, he pushed back against the Kennedy oligarchy that existed before him, but his was just a different kind. Money has always been in politics - he's at least an expert in that because he played the same game. And yes, incumbents have advantages over challengers. And water is wet.

[UNI88]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.

Transcript:

HARTMANN: Our Supreme Court has now said, “unlimited money in politics.” It seems like a violation of principles of democracy. … Your thoughts on that?

CARTER: It violates the essence of what made America a great country in its political system. Now it’s just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president. And the same thing applies to governors and U.S. senators and congress members. So now we’ve just seen a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect and sometimes get favors for themselves after the election’s over. … The incumbents, Democrats and Republicans, look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves. Somebody’s who’s already in Congress has a lot more to sell to an avid contributor than somebody who’s just a challenger.

https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

It's about influence, not just about money. Our political system has also been subverted by unions, especially public sector unions, who contribute time and money to the candidates who support them and their agendas.

[kalm]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.



https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

It's about influence, not just about money. Our political system has also been subverted by unions, especially public sector unions, who contribute time and money to the candidates who support them and their agendas.

Of course they do. Why wouldn’t they under the current system?

Oligarchy is rule by the few. Political outcomes still work way more in favor of those few.

[kalm]

Good read on monopoly and 1700’s corporatism. “taxation without representation” was a bit of a myth.

There’s a pervasive myth in America—promoted by wealthy anti-tax activists—that the Revolutionary War was fought because colonists didn’t want to pay taxes to England. While that sentiment was certainly widespread, the spark that lit the fuse of the Revolution was monopoly and a giant tax cut for the world’s largest corporation, not an increase in taxes.………..

In a rare-book store around 2000, I came upon a first edi- tion of A Retrospect of the Boston Tea-Party, With a Memoir of George R. T. Hewes, a Survivor of the Little Band of Patriots Who Drowned the Tea in Boston Harbour in 1773. Because the identities of the Boston Tea Party participants had been hidden (other than Samuel Adams), and all were sworn to secrecy for the next 50 years, this is the only existing first- person account of the event by a participant.
Hewes’s description suggests that the Boston Tea Party resembled today’s growing protests against corporate monopolies, as well as the efforts of small towns to protect themselves from chain-store retailers, frackers, toxic waste sites, coal-fired power plants, and factory farms.
Although schoolchildren are usually taught that the Amer- ican Revolution was a rebellion against “taxation without representation,” akin to modern-day conservative taxpayer revolts, in fact what led to the Revolution was rage against a transnational corporation that, by the 1760s, dominated trade from China to India to the Caribbean and controlled nearly all commerce to and from North America, with subsidies and special dispensation from the British crown.
Hewes wrote, “The [East India] Company received per- mission to transport tea, free of all duty, from Great Britain to America,” allowing it to wipe out New England–based tea wholesalers and mom-and-pop stores and take over the tea business in all of America.
Hence, it was no longer the small vessels of private merchants, who went to vend tea for their own account in the ports of the colonies, but, on the contrary, ships of an enormous burthen, that transported immense quantities of this commodity. . . . The colonies were now arrived at the decisive moment when they must cast the dye, and determine their course.2

https://open.substack.com/pub/thomhartm ... paign=post

[GannonFan]

Good read on monopoly and 1700’s corporatism. “taxation without representation” was a bit of a myth.

There’s a pervasive myth in America—promoted by wealthy anti-tax activists—that the Revolutionary War was fought because colonists didn’t want to pay taxes to England. While that sentiment was certainly widespread, the spark that lit the fuse of the Revolution was monopoly and a giant tax cut for the world’s largest corporation, not an increase in taxes.………..

In a rare-book store around 2000, I came upon a first edi- tion of A Retrospect of the Boston Tea-Party, With a Memoir of George R. T. Hewes, a Survivor of the Little Band of Patriots Who Drowned the Tea in Boston Harbour in 1773. Because the identities of the Boston Tea Party participants had been hidden (other than Samuel Adams), and all were sworn to secrecy for the next 50 years, this is the only existing first- person account of the event by a participant.
Hewes’s description suggests that the Boston Tea Party resembled today’s growing protests against corporate monopolies, as well as the efforts of small towns to protect themselves from chain-store retailers, frackers, toxic waste sites, coal-fired power plants, and factory farms.
Although schoolchildren are usually taught that the Amer- ican Revolution was a rebellion against “taxation without representation,” akin to modern-day conservative taxpayer revolts, in fact what led to the Revolution was rage against a transnational corporation that, by the 1760s, dominated trade from China to India to the Caribbean and controlled nearly all commerce to and from North America, with subsidies and special dispensation from the British crown.
Hewes wrote, “The [East India] Company received per- mission to transport tea, free of all duty, from Great Britain to America,” allowing it to wipe out New England–based tea wholesalers and mom-and-pop stores and take over the tea business in all of America.
Hence, it was no longer the small vessels of private merchants, who went to vend tea for their own account in the ports of the colonies, but, on the contrary, ships of an enormous burthen, that transported immense quantities of this commodity. . . . The colonies were now arrived at the decisive moment when they must cast the dye, and determine their course.2

https://open.substack.com/pub/thomhartm ... paign=post

I don't like saying something was "a bit of a myth" just because there was something else going on simultaneously. It simplifies something to the point where you try to make it one thing that caused something. Even your article says the sentiment of not wanting to pay taxes was widespread.

It was many things that led to the Revolution - the East India Corporation having such a pernicious monopoly is certainly one - but there's a lot of argument that the die was cast for the Revolution to happen long before this happened and long before the Boston Tea Party. Sam Adams and his compatriots were well on the road to Revolution going back to almost the Stamp Act, and certainly by the time there were British soldiers being camped (not quartered in private homes yet) in Boston by the late 1760's. Hard to say there was any one, real decisive moment though, other than the Declaration of Independence. Heck, they were still debating whether to even declare independence in the spring of 1776, and that was a full year after the initial military engagements in Massachusetts.

[houndawg]

Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

This was from a few years back. It’s undeniable. Except he could have included SCOTUS as a willing player.



https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jim ... l-bribery/

Eh, read some books on Carter, when he was in his prime he was every bit the ruthless and hardcore politician that he seems to be castigating here. Sure, he pushed back against the Kennedy oligarchy that existed before him, but his was just a different kind. Money has always been in politics - he's at least an expert in that because he played the same game. And yes, incumbents have advantages over challengers. And water is wet.

And we're an oligarchy

[houndawg]

Good read on monopoly and 1700’s corporatism. “taxation without representation” was a bit of a myth.



https://open.substack.com/pub/thomhartm ... paign=post

I don't like saying something was "a bit of a myth" just because there was something else going on simultaneously. It simplifies something to the point where you try to make it one thing that caused something. Even your article says the sentiment of not wanting to pay taxes was widespread.

It was many things that led to the Revolution - the East India Corporation having such a pernicious monopoly is certainly one - but there's a lot of argument that the die was cast for the Revolution to happen long before this happened and long before the Boston Tea Party. Sam Adams and his compatriots were well on the road to Revolution going back to almost the Stamp Act, and certainly by the time there were British soldiers being camped (not quartered in private homes yet) in Boston by the late 1760's. Hard to say there was any one, real decisive moment though, other than the Declaration of Independence. Heck, they were still debating whether to even declare independence in the spring of 1776, and that was a full year after the initial military engagements in Massachusetts.

I think the point is more about the relative weights given to the stories - two things happening at the same time but you only hear about one of them from the "historians".

[kalm]

I don't like saying something was "a bit of a myth" just because there was something else going on simultaneously. It simplifies something to the point where you try to make it one thing that caused something. Even your article says the sentiment of not wanting to pay taxes was widespread.

It was many things that led to the Revolution - the East India Corporation having such a pernicious monopoly is certainly one - but there's a lot of argument that the die was cast for the Revolution to happen long before this happened and long before the Boston Tea Party. Sam Adams and his compatriots were well on the road to Revolution going back to almost the Stamp Act, and certainly by the time there were British soldiers being camped (not quartered in private homes yet) in Boston by the late 1760's. Hard to say there was any one, real decisive moment though, other than the Declaration of Independence. Heck, they were still debating whether to even declare independence in the spring of 1776, and that was a full year after the initial military engagements in Massachusetts.

I think the point is more about the relative weights given to the stories - two things happening at the same time but you only hear about one of them from the "historians".

And no one likes paying taxes, monarchies, or colonialism. Except when the beneficiaries.

[GannonFan]

I don't like saying something was "a bit of a myth" just because there was something else going on simultaneously. It simplifies something to the point where you try to make it one thing that caused something. Even your article says the sentiment of not wanting to pay taxes was widespread.

It was many things that led to the Revolution - the East India Corporation having such a pernicious monopoly is certainly one - but there's a lot of argument that the die was cast for the Revolution to happen long before this happened and long before the Boston Tea Party. Sam Adams and his compatriots were well on the road to Revolution going back to almost the Stamp Act, and certainly by the time there were British soldiers being camped (not quartered in private homes yet) in Boston by the late 1760's. Hard to say there was any one, real decisive moment though, other than the Declaration of Independence. Heck, they were still debating whether to even declare independence in the spring of 1776, and that was a full year after the initial military engagements in Massachusetts.

I think the point is more about the relative weights given to the stories - two things happening at the same time but you only hear about one of them from the "historians".

You just need to read more. Even back in the 1760's they were already toning down the taxation without representation mantra. They were fearful that GB would just throw them a bone and allow a couple of representatives in Parliament for the colonies. It wouldn't have changed any of the votes as that small number versus the larger majority wouldn't have altered anything. Historians have been very clear about that.

[houndawg]

I think the point is more about the relative weights given to the stories - two things happening at the same time but you only hear about one of them from the "historians".

You just need to read more. Even back in the 1760's they were already toning down the taxation without representation mantra. They were fearful that GB would just throw them a bone and allow a couple of representatives in Parliament for the colonies. It wouldn't have changed any of the votes as that small number versus the larger majority wouldn't have altered anything. Historians have been very clear about that.

Actually I don't recall ever hearing about that in History classes - probably why I never found the subject interesting until long after school.

[GannonFan]

You just need to read more. Even back in the 1760's they were already toning down the taxation without representation mantra. They were fearful that GB would just throw them a bone and allow a couple of representatives in Parliament for the colonies. It wouldn't have changed any of the votes as that small number versus the larger majority wouldn't have altered anything. Historians have been very clear about that.

Actually I don't recall ever hearing about that in History classes - probably why I never found the subject interesting until long after school.

History class and historians are two often very different sources of information. Elementary school history is all about the no taxation for representation thing. The Declaration of Independence, which lists something like 28 specific grievances to justify the independence from Great Britain, only references the slogan once, coming in at #17 on the list. The other 27 were pretty significant or they wouldn't have been brought up too. Didn't make for the catchy slogan you hear in elementary school history, though.

I thought the biography on Sam Adams by Stacy Shiff was pretty good. Her writing is plenty erudite - I actually prefer my books to be a little less so, I found myself stopping quite a lot to look up words I've never seen - and she really covered that period from 1763 to 1775 pretty well. Adams, as well as Boston, certainly earned their distinction as respectively the father and birthplace of the Revolution.