{"id":125249,"date":"2014-06-19T16:45:58","date_gmt":"2014-06-19T16:45:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=125249"},"modified":"2014-06-19T16:46:41","modified_gmt":"2014-06-19T16:46:41","slug":"tell-member-congress-crony-capitalist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/politics\/tell-member-congress-crony-capitalist\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Tell If Your Member of Congress Is a Crony Capitalist"},"content":{"rendered":"

Timothy Karr<\/em><\/p>\n

Last Tuesday, Rep. Eric Cantor learned the hard way that crony capitalism comes at a political cost. In a decisive\u00a010-point upset<\/a>, Cantor\u2019s Republican primary opponent David Brat defeated the Virginia congressman\u00a0after charging<\/a>\u00a0that he was \u201ctrying to buy this election with corporate cash.\u201d<\/p>\n

Few inside Washington thought charges like this would stick; for decades they\u2019ve opened their campaign coffers to millions of dollars from Fortune 500 firms without fearing any consequences at the ballot box.<\/p>\n

Since arriving on Capitol Hill in 2001, Cantor has received corporate contributions extending from Bank of America to Verizon\u00a0and beyond<\/a>. Only four other lawmakers took in more corporate cash during the most recent election cycle.<\/p>\n

In exchange, Cantor became big businesses\u2019 \u201cace in the hole.\u201d According to\u00a0TIME<\/em><\/a>, big banks, energy and defense industries, insurance firms, and phone and cable companies knew they could rely on Cantor to put their interests before those of his constituents back in Virginia\u2019s 7th District.<\/p>\n

Shape Shifters<\/strong><\/p>\n

While Cantor\u2019s cash-stuffed accounts stand out, he\u2019s not alone. Congress is awash with special-interest campaign contributions. To win in 2012, U.S. senators had to raise an average of\u00a0$14,351 a day<\/a>, every single day of the week.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a big-money game that has made Americans cynical about politics. A 2011\u00a0Global Strategy Group<\/a>\u00a0poll found that 71 percent of Republicans and 81 percent of Democrats believed that \u201cmoney buys results in Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elected officials are so dependent on raising this cash that they have become \u201cshape shifters,\u201d in the words of Harvard Law scholar\u00a0Larry Lessig<\/a>: \u201cThey constantly adjust their views in light of what they know will help them to raise money.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the realm of Internet policy, that too often means jumping through hoops to support the agenda of phone and cable companies \u00e2\u20ac\u0160\u2013 even when doing so undermines the rights of hundreds of millions of Internet users.<\/p>\n

Cronies vs. the Internet<\/strong><\/p>\n

We saw this in 2011 as members of Congress lined up to support SOPA and PIPA, two immensely unpopular bills that would have hobbled the Internet with draconian copyright restrictions favored by the movie and recording industries. We\u2019re seeing it now as many in Washington\u00a0fall into line<\/a>\u00a0against real protections for\u00a0Net Neutrality<\/a>, the widely supported principle that Internet users should be allowed to decide where they go, what they do and whom they connect with online.<\/p>\n

The race for corporate dollars crosses political lines. In 2010, 74 House Democrats signed an anti-Net Neutrality letter. A subsequent\u00a0Sunlight Foundation<\/a>\u00a0investigation found these representatives received, on average, more money from phone and cable companies than other members of the House had.<\/p>\n

In 2014,\u00a020 House Democrats<\/a>\u00a0signed a similar letter opposing real Net Neutrality protections.\u00a0According to research from Maplight<\/a>, these Democrats have received, on average, much more in campaign contributions from the same companies as before.<\/p>\n

One in particular,\u00a0Rep. John Barrow (D-Ga.)<\/a>, received nearly $60,000 from these industries \u00e2\u20ac\u0160\u2013\u00e2\u20ac\u0160 more than five times the average amount his Democratic counterparts received \u00e2\u20ac\u0160\u2013\u00e2\u20ac\u0160 in the most recent election cycle. In return, the largest phone and cable companies have relied on Barrow to legislate on their behalf.<\/p>\n

Like Barrow,\u00a0Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.)<\/a>\u00a0remains faithful to the cause of crony capitalism. Companies can rely on her to barge into committee hearings (even for those committees she doesn\u2019t sit on) to denounce any effort to support Net Neutrality.<\/p>\n

In February, she introduced legislation to stop the Federal Communications Commission from even considering Net Neutrality rules, calling such free speech protections \u201csocialistic<\/a>.\u201d In May, she joined three other GOP cronies on a letter expressing \u201cgrave concern<\/a>\u201d about any potential FCC actions to protect the open Internet.<\/p>\n

And, to no one\u2019s surprise, AT&T, Verizon and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association make up three of Blackburn\u2019s top five career donors, according to the\u00a0Center for Responsive Politics<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, constituents back in Hickman County in the center of Blackburn\u2019s Tennessee district struggle to get fast and affordable Internet services. Only 38 percent of Hickman residents have access to broadband services, far below the Tennessee statewide average of 58 percent, according to a\u00a02010 Connected Tennessee survey<\/a>. (A 2010 FCC survey found that\u00a0<\/a>67 percent<\/a>\u00a0of households nationwide contain someone who accesses broadband at home.)<\/p>\n

What Makes a Crony Capitalist<\/strong><\/p>\n

But what distinguishes crony capitalists like Barrow and Blackburn is not the fact that they take corporate money \u00e2\u20ac\u0160\u2013 every member of Congress does \u00e2\u20ac\u0160\u2013 but the degree to which they shape shift to earn it, molding their views in a way only their benefactors could love.<\/p>\n

The Center for Responsive Politics\u00a0website<\/a>\u00a0is a good place to discover whether your member of Congress is also a crony capitalist.<\/p>\n

First, find who his or her biggest corporate donors are. Then check his or her record on policies that may impact the bottom lines of those companies. Does she support or oppose\u00a0financial-sector reform<\/a>? Has he recently signed a letter or released a\u00a0statement<\/a>\u00a0opposing\u00a0EPA curbs<\/a>\u00a0to coal-plant emissions?<\/p>\n

Do those positions match those of his or her largest corporate donors? Yes? If that doesn\u2019t bother you, it should. And you should let\u00a0your members of Congress<\/a>\u00a0know whom they really work for.<\/p>\n

For decades our elected officials have shrugged off grassroots concerns about the corrupting influence of corporate cash. After Cantor\u2019s defeat last week, many should be having second thoughts.<\/p>\n

Reprinted<\/a> with permission<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Timothy Karr Last Tuesday, Rep. Eric Cantor learned the hard way that crony capitalism comes at a political cost. In a decisive\u00a010-point upset, Cantor\u2019s Republican primary opponent David Brat defeated the Virginia congressman\u00a0after charging\u00a0that he was \u201ctrying to buy this election with corporate cash.\u201d Few inside Washington thought charges like this would stick; for decades […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,17],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-125249","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125249\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}