What Does Buying A Republican Politician Get You?

Posted by | February 21, 2011 20:27 | Filed under: Top Stories


By Yashwanth Manjunath

Now that the Republicans control the House and have regained “The Power of the Purse,” they are determined to use their budget to repay their corporate campaign daddies for their generous contributions. So what can a Republican politician do for you?

After spending over 75% of their money on Republicans, big oil executives can worry no more about the pesky EPA! The House Republican plan to cut the EPA budget by a third and handcuff their ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions will make it much tougher to enforce those irritating penalties for polluting the air and water supply. But it’s okay; important people like the Koch brothers, the largest oil and gas industry contributors, will never have to drink the water or breathe the air that they pollute. That stuff is for the peasants.

For their friendly contributors in the health insurance industry, the Republican plan to defund health care reform will allow the industry to avoid some of the painful monetary consequences of no longer being able to abuse sick people. Those who should especially be worried are parents with children who have pre-existing conditions.

For the big telecommunications contributors like Verizon, the Republican budget would stop the FCC from preventing broadband providers from interfering with Internet traffic on their networks. Say goodbye to any hopes at net neutrality and say hello to a corporate takeover of the Internet!

But the biggest gift of all in the Republican budget/corporate goodie bag was reserved for Wall Street. The Republican budget would limit this year’s budget for the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to $80 million. It would also cut the budgets of the SEC and the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, agencies directly responsible for enforcing other parts of the new financial reform law.

In exchange for dramatically shifting their campaign contributions from Democrats to Republicans, the bankers on Wall Street are being rewarded with fewer cops checking in on them. Which means fewer cops looking out for our money.

These extreme corporate giveaways will probably be watered down by the Democratic Senate. But if the new Republican-Tea Party takes the presidency in 2012, we can expect to see all this and more enacted on behalf of the corporate sponsors of the Republican Party. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal for the corporations and their lobbyists, and a raw deal for everyone else.

Maybe the American people should hire lobbyists to represent us?

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