{"id":12107,"date":"2022-05-16T10:25:14","date_gmt":"2022-05-16T14:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/articles\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/"},"modified":"2022-05-16T10:25:14","modified_gmt":"2022-05-16T14:25:14","slug":"the-ills-that-kill-democracy","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/de\/articles\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Die \u00dcbel, die die Demokratie t\u00f6ten"},"template":"","class_list":["post-12107","article","type-article","status-publish","hentry","article_type-blog-post"],"acf":{"details":{"summary":"","featured_image":null,"article_type":1103,"authors":["{\"site_id\":\"1\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":12033}"],"related_issues":[103,134,136,137,149,165,2065,2066,2082],"related_work":false,"location":null},"sidebar":{"helper_enable_sidebar":false,"helper_media_contact":{"heading":"Media Contact","manually_enter_person":false,"person":null,"name":"","role":"","phone":"","email":""},"helper_links_downloads":{"heading":"Links & Downloads","links":null}},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"content":"

Call me na\u00efve.\u00a0 I arrived in Washington, DC fifty-two years ago full of vim and vigor to take part in the great pageant of American reform, convinced that in the years ahead the political arc would bend ever-upward toward a fuller democracy.\u00a0 I had studied the nation\u2019s history, broken free of a politically conservative upbringing (it would be called moderate Republican today, if there was such a thing), and concluded that being on the ground in DC was where I needed to be to help bend the arc skyward. \u00a0So, I spent the bulk of the next half-century trying to do just that.\u00a0 Those years included fifteen working in the U. S. Senate, eight in the Executive Branch, over a decade as a member of the Federal Communications Commission, and almost another decade now at Common Cause, the renowned watchdog citizens group.\u00a0 I witnessed great changes, to be sure, even meaningful progress in such areas as civil, women\u2019s, gender, disability and indigenous people\u2019s rights.\u00a0 But so much remains undone.<\/p>\r\n

All change is not progress. The arc hits speed bumps along the way, and sometimes the journey I thought I was on seemed more like Sisyphus trying to push that rock uphill.\u00a0 \u201cKeep pushing\u201d is still my mantra, but the awful damage we have inflicted, or let happen, to our democracy now threatens its very existence. Democracy\u2019s discontents are many, and I will expand on a few of them below, but note first that every passing day of not confronting them makes democracy\u2019s fulfillment ever less likely. \u00a0In truth, our democracy is crumbling. As Joe Biden often says: I\u2019m not joking.<\/p>\r\n

Herewith a quick overview of some of the things that ail our democracy:<\/p>\r\n

MONEY.\u00a0 <\/strong>Over $14 billion were spent on the 2020 election campaigns<\/a>.\u00a0 That\u2019s just sickening. \u00a0Big money corrupts the campaigns and co-opts the politicians.\u00a0 It sets the priorities in Congress, determines the schedule of legislation, and often actually writes the laws that are passed. Most office-holders spend the bulk of their days, each day and every day, raising money and giving access and doing favors for those who write the big checks.\u00a0 I realize this is no news flash\u2014most people \u201cget it\u201d that money holds sway in politics.\u00a0 But \u201cgetting it\u201d doesn\u2019t fix it. \u00a0Congress, big money\u2019s loyal beneficiary, could conceivably do that.\u00a0 But it won\u2019t\u2014unless we demand it. \u00a0Most of us aren\u2019t.<\/p>\r\n

GERRYMANDERING. <\/strong>\u00a0Our \u201csystem\u201d of drawing electoral districts has taken the competition out of all but a few dozen House of Representatives races.\u00a0 Incumbents win, challengers lose.\u00a0 And these one-party districts quickly devolve into conservative strongholds becoming more conservative and liberal ones becoming more liberal.\u00a0 It\u2019s not good for what political scientists used to call the \u201cVital Center\u201d.\u00a0 A lot of us \u201cget\u201d this, too, but the incumbents are in charge in state capitals just like they are in Congress, and they continue on their merry way.\u00a0 Who\u2019s to fix it?\u00a0 Maybe us\u2014if we demand it.\u00a0 But most of us aren\u2019t.<\/p>\r\n

THE FILIBUSTER.<\/strong>\u00a0 As gerrymandering distorts the House, the filibuster renders the Senate ineffective.\u00a0 Contrary to anything in the Constitution, the filibuster was never intended to apply to most legislation.\u00a0 True, the founders carved out a few exceptions requiring more than a simple majority, like approving treaties or judging impeachments, but they did not envision and certainly did not approve requiring super-majorities to get the nation\u2019s business done.\u00a0 Even when I went to work in the Senate in 1970, Senators worked hard to build coalitions and win votes for their proposals, and when they failed, they didn\u2019t resort to end-running the Constitution to keep the other side from winning.\u00a0 Most of us \u201cget\u201d this one, too, but still the obstructionists run the process.\u00a0 Who\u2019s to fix it?\u00a0 Maybe us\u2014if we demand it.\u00a0 But most of us aren\u2019t.<\/p>\r\n

THE JUDICIARY.<\/strong>\u00a0 This is a more recent addition to my catalogue of threats to our democracy.\u00a0 Many of our courts are becoming as polarized as Congress and state legislatures.\u00a0 The system just isn\u2019t working very well.\u00a0 Judges appointed or elected on the basis of their political ideologies are making a mess of impartial justice.\u00a0 Entrenched interests shop for courts where their kind of judges sit.\u00a0 And, too often, a politicized district court will decide a case one way, an appeals court with another ideology will reverse the district court\u2019s decision, and it may end up at the Supreme Court where, we all know, political viewpoint can easily trump impartial decision-making.\u00a0 I realize few among us can be truly impartial, and we should not expect unachievable purity in our courts, or any place else for that matter, but when politics trumps an open mind in the dispensing of justice, democracy takes another hit.<\/p>\r\n

I also believe that the increasing trend toward electing judges and making them conduct campaigns for their seats is a deep pot-hole on the road to a functional judiciary, especially in an environment where big money and redistricting influence those very elections.\u00a0 Diminishing trust in the institutions of government is close to the core of our seeming inability to tackle the many problems that bedevil us.\u00a0 When that lack of trust extends to the courts who are charged with the foundational responsibility of protecting our most basic values, we lose an essential component of successful government.\u00a0 I doubt Congress will fix this any time soon.\u00a0 Who\u2019s to fix it?\u00a0 Maybe us\u2014if we demand it.\u00a0 But most of us aren\u2019t.<\/p>\r\n

MEDIA.<\/strong>\u00a0 I know\u2014regular readers of my musings are thinking it took me an awfully long time to get to the subject that some think consumes me.\u00a0 So, I won\u2019t belabor it here.\u00a0 But I am more concerned than ever that our media is failing its responsibility to inform our civic dialogue and give us the facts we need in order to keep our democracy going.\u00a0 The consolidation of the media, the substitution of glitzy corporate infotainment for investigative journalism, the mass closing of news bureaus, and the loss of over a third of our newsroom employees have seriously dumbed down our national conversation.\u00a0 We need a thriving journalism to hold power accountable, to tackle issues that don\u2019t receive due coverage, and to dig for facts instead of shouting opinions.\u00a0 Hedge fund buy-outs and private equity news management are poor guardians for the kind of information upon which our national well-being depends.<\/p>\r\n

Hopefully reinvigorated independent government agencies like the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission, along with the Department of Justice\u2019s anti-trust team, will reverse some of the damage that has been done.\u00a0 Sadly, Congress and its big-money patrons have so far refused to confirm the nomination for an FCC slot that is needed to give the commission a working majority.\u00a0 Once that is done, this agency can move ahead to begin reviving public interest media oversight.\u00a0 Yet truly comprehensive media reform can come only when the people demand it.\u00a0 But most of us aren\u2019t.<\/p>\r\n

TECHNOLOGY.<\/strong> \u00a0This leads us to the final challenge I will discuss today.\u00a0 Broadband and the internet could have, should have, led us into a new age of enlightened democracy.\u00a0 To be sure, broadband has enhanced our lives in many ways, and it has long been my contention that access to this technology is a civil right because no one can be a fully-functioning member of society without access to robust connectivity.\u00a0 The good news is that the pandemic woke up enough decision-makers to pass the Infrastructure Act that provided $65 billion to help bring modern broadband to every household across the country. House Majority Leader Jim Clyburn deserves huge thanks for his leadership in making this happen.\u00a0 Now the job is to make certain these monies are wisely spent, that they are not monopolized by the big telecom and cable companies, and that due diligence is practiced at every step on the road to universal broadband coverage.<\/p>\r\n

But there is no gainsaying that the internet has in many ways gone astray.\u00a0 What was once envisioned as the new town square of democracy has in many instances become the purveyor of disinformation and misinformation that have poisoned our civic dialogue and contributed mightily to the polarization of our politics.\u00a0 Just as bad, we have done little about it.\u00a0 While other nations, notably in the European Union, have passed legislation and regulations to drastically curtail these abuses, the United States has failed to act.\u00a0 Oh, we talk about it a lot, and some good bills have been introduced in Congress to provide at least a little basic oversight, but nothing really substantive has been accomplished, nor has the totality of the tech challenge even been broached.\u00a0 Instead, it\u2019s become another partisan and polarizing political free-for-all, and the big tech companies are spending hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying to make sure nobody trots on their turfs.<\/p>\r\n

Hopefully some anti-trust cases will move forward, as they are in other countries.\u00a0 But these take years to decide.\u00a0 Just as bad, important courts (see above) have adopted anti-trust theories that remind us more of the nineteenth century Gilded Age than they do of twenty-first century America.<\/p>\r\n

The internet is at the heart of our future.\u00a0 It becomes more pervasive with each passing day.\u00a0 Something so integral to our lives has, of course, huge public implications.\u00a0 It cannot be allowed to just go its own way, with different tech giants practicing vastly different approaches to privacy, content modification, and disinformation.\u00a0 It is critically important that these firms be subject to some public interest oversight, some limitations on their ever-growing size, and some requirements for transparency in not just their algorithms, but also their overall behavior.\u00a0 No company in a democratic society should be allowed to exercise so much power as these tech and other communications behemoths wield.<\/p>\r\n

There is a time to debate and a time to act.\u00a0 But there will only be action if we, the people, demand it.\u00a0 The time for spectator democracy is past.\u00a0 The time for participatory democracy is here.\u00a0 Now.<\/p>\r\nMichael J. Copps \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>"}}]},"yoast_head":"\nThe Ills That Kill Democracy - Common Cause<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/de\/artikel-2\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"de_DE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Ills That Kill Democracy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/de\/artikel-2\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Common Cause\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/CommonCause\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/CC-Share-Graphic-Main9.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"630\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@CommonCause\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/articles\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/articles\/the-ills-that-kill-democracy\/\",\"name\":\"The Ills That Kill Democracy - 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