This is going to sting a little

I knew very early in my life that I would suck as a politician. My mother told me. Success in politics means getting elected and re-elected, more than it means legislating in the best interest of constituents. I used to rant on and on about the illegal fishing village that blighted what could have been a scenic view of Hunts Bay along the causeway that connects Portmore, St. Catherine with Kingston. I could not understand why the powers that be could not, or would not, level the shacks that presented traffic and health hazards and keep the inhabitants from returning. (As it turns out, the fishing village was finally moved in late 2009 to allow for highway construction.) My mother tried at the time to explain please-the-people politics to me, but it did not make sense to me that government would act against people's long term best interest to win political points in the short term. Surely, it was a just a Jamaican thing.

When I worked with a utility in a large United States municipality, I was confused when raising rates was weighed in the context of losing votes, even though the money was needed for federally mandated capital improvements. Politicians and bureaucrats made an assessment that more votes would be lost by raising the rates, than by continued poor service, and federal fines. Surely, it was just a local government thing.

For better or for worse, the Obama administration has made implementing health care reform the idée fixe of their first year in office. As the debate has raged on, dissenters muddied the waters, raised unwarranted fears, then said they could not vote for a health care bill their constituents don’t support. Because of the price tag and complexity, the health care bill was a hard sell to begin with. Rather than engage in intelligent discourse about its merits and the possible immediate and long term benefits to the American public, politicians pandered to the party line and to the short-term, mis/uninformed whim of constituents. As President Obama pointed out in Wednesday’s State of the Union address, the health bill has never been good politics. Taxes, economic incentives for businesses, increased utility rates, reduced bus routes are other things that are often not popular with the public, and hence not good politics.

It must be a quandary for the best-intentioned politicians: how do they do what is best for their constituents – even when voters do not realize it is for their own good – and still win votes. For politicians whose only intention is to maintain their clutch on power, access and benefits of office, there is no such conflict. It is the electorate that must make the difference. We must become educated citizens who understand that sometimes long term gains must be prefaced by some discomfort. Immediate gratification should not be the driving incentive for supporting or opposing policy, or politicians. Our representatives must be required to show substantive long-term solutions for their time in office, not just feel good bits that leave problems unresolved. We must grow up.

The price of politics

The success of a company is determined by how much it makes. The success of CEOs, boards of directors, and entrepreneurs is measured by profits. A corporation's sole reason for existence is to make money. It is to be assumed that any and all their actions are underlined by that singular motive. Even so called good-will gestures by corporations are aimed at maintaining a positive public image, which has direct profit correlations. It is not a large leap to see that the choice a company makes to financially support a politician's election campaign will be made to serve its bottom-line, not the general good of the American public. It is true that those two goals may be one and the same on occasion, but invariably where there is a choice to be made between the two, a company will choose profit - as it should. Companies make political contributions to be able to have access to politicians and to shape policy that ensure their future profitability.

The Supreme Court's ruling on January 21 that allows corporations to spend limitless amounts of money in support of political candidates undermines the democratic process. There is a reason millions of dollars is poured into advertising for elections. Those are not wasted dollars; voters are in fact influenced by the messages that bombard them over and over again in the months and weeks leading up to an election. As we saw in the last presidential election, even after ads are pulled for inaccuracy or inappropriate statements, they continue to influence what people think about the candidates in a race. The general public is far more likely to see and get information about the candidates and the issues from a commercial, than from a credible news source.

When a corporation is allowed to invest in the election of a candidate, they are, in essence, being allowed to buy the public's attention, and votes. Candidates may now find themselves running against large corporations with deep pockets and endless resources. Will any candidate be able to match the dollars to get his message out adequately if his opposition is supported by a corporation, let alone entire industries? To assume that letting companies inject millions into election campaigns does not come with the expectation of reciprocity is to put more faith than most of us have in politicians, and to expect corporations to not act in their own financial best interest. What will the inevitable return on investment for the corporations mean for the good of the American public?

The only good thing about the Supreme Court's ruling is that the public will get to see more clearly who is up for sale.

For whom the death knell sounds

Was it arrogance that caused the Democratics to lose the Massachusetts seat held by the late Senator Ted Kennedy for almost 50 years? Did the party not realize that hard economic times and scepticism about health care reform has faded the state's blue tradition? Whatever the reasons, President Obama and the Democratic Party now find themselves without the protection of a filbuster majority as they try to push ahead with controversial legislation and attempts to fix the economy.

It seems particularly ominous that Scott Brown won in a special election to represent a state that mandated universal health care in 2006 (with Brown's vote and support), by promising to vote against a similar national health care plan fought for by his predecessor. The late senator must be rolling over in his grave. Sitting parties are always vulnerable when the economy is doing poorly, and the Obama administration is also faced with a voting public who did not necessarily agree with the bank bailouts and are disgusted by the obnoxious bonuses being mete out in the financial industry. They have also been frightened by misinformation and confusion about an expensive and cumbersome health care plan. With mid-term elections coming in November, and the economic forecast still showing rainy days ahead, Democrats have a tough row to hoe if they want to maintain their tenuous majority.

Many of the people who handed out buttons, made phone calls from party offices across the country, and wept in the streets at the prospect of electing the first black president, have now gone back to their politically inactive lives. The excitement is all over and the waggonists have abandoned the work that needs to be done. While President Obama's election mobilized the political right, democrats on the Hill and on the streets rested on their laurels despite the big issues at stake. There has been no uprising to defend the things upon which President Obama campaigned and won, such as healthcare reform and economy recovery. There has been no answer to the Teabagger movement; no animated, angry left.

To be true agents of change we must go beyond turning up to elect the president. We must be educated constituents that understand large global and national issues. We must be able to understand how larger issues connect to our quality of life - our jobs, taxes, housing, and health. Every election - municipal, state, federal - is important. Every issue is worth our attention. We cannot be so lazy as to hold a president to campaign promises, without providing the support needed to accomplish them.

Massachusetts is behind us, but there is much ahead to lose or to accomplish. What we do next will sound the death knell for real progress, or the rallying cry towards a truly historic period of American history.