National Nurses United

RAD_Sept 10/5/10 2:24 PM Page 11 Rose Ann DeMoro Executive Director, National Nurses United Not For Sale This November, vote nurses' values of caring, compassion, and community. We're no longer citizens, we're just prodwho can't get to the polls for economic f there is one enduring theme of uct consumers. The only way we see our reasons, or those in low-income neighborthe 2010 elections it might well be the growing perversion of our politi- hoods with fewer polling places, or ex-felons elected leaders is in endless ads, our votes treated as just another commodity to be who have fulfilled their debt to society. cal system by unimaginable wealth, bought and sold in commercials that devalBut while most of us can now vote, fewer best symbolized by two candidates ue our ability to interact with the candidates people than ever can actually run for office and for governor on opposite coasts, or make informed votes. have a chance to win, especially in the added Meg Whitman in California and Rick Scott Third, it profoundly distorts public policy in climate of the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens in Florida. United ruling, which permits unlimited spend- the positions taken by the millionaire candiWhitman, as has been well chronicled, had dates and their corporate sponsors. The result: ing by corporations in federal elections. by early October already poured $120 million candidate after candidate proposing more tax The combination of enormously rich of her personal wealth into her campaign, shelters and loopholes for large corporations surpassing the record for personal spending by candidates and unshackled corporate and wealthy individuals, deeper cuts in social money in elections presents a systemic shift one candidate set by another billionaire, New safety net programs that assist the York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. most low income and most Scott, the ex-hospital CEO, It profoundly distorts public policy vulnerable of our society, and shelled $50 million out of in the positions taken by the millionaire increased vilification of those, pocket to win Florida's candidates and their corporate such as unions, that resist this Republican primary. As the sponsors. The result: candidate after class warfare. Christian Science Monitor candidate proposing more tax shelters The candidate of the noted Sept. 3, "he paid for so and loopholes for large corporations future, and the chairs of our many 30-second ads that if and wealthy individuals, deeper cuts governing bodies will increasone station broadcast them in social safety net programs that ingly be filled by those like end to end it would have assist the most low income and most Linda McMahon, the milliontaken 25 days to see them all." vulnerable of our society, and increased aire Senate candidate in Scott and Whitman are vilification of those, such as unions, Connecticut, who garnered hardly alone. Millionaires and that resist this class warfare. national headlines for suggestbillionaires candidates who were ing in a press conference recononce content to simply finance the sideration of the minimum wage and in the nature of our political process with campaigns of others who would carry out their "whether or not we ought to have increases in huge, ominous implications. agenda can now be found across the map. the minimum wage." First, it sharply limits who can run or This trend is the latest twist in the long fight Or Meg Whitman, whose solution to the compete with those who can saturate the for democracy in America harkening back to airwaves as Whitman and Scott have shown, job crisis is to slash 40,000 more public servthe early days of our republic when only white, ice jobs and eliminate the capital gains tax and bolster their campaign with unlimited male, property owners were allowed to vote. which, as her opponent Jerry Brown noted in spending in other areas, as Whitman has Or as Alexander Keyssar wrote in an excellent their first debate, only helps the richest Calidone in mega salaries to campaign consult2000 book, The Right to Vote: The Contested fornians like Whitman and her biggest donors. ants, political mail, and other activities. History of Democracy in the United States, in "We run the risk of having a body that looks Second, it escalates the transformation of most of the colonies men had to "own land of less and less like America," said Sheila campaigns away from the retail politics that specified acreage" or an equivalent "monetary Krumholz, executive director of the Center for once characterized our elections, where value" to enjoy the franchise. candidates actually met and talked to voters. Responsive Politics, told ABC News in August. Winning the right to vote for all took And a devalued democracy that looks a lot like The millionaires and corporate-sponsored many decades more —as we recounted in the monarchy we shed blood to replace. candidates of today virtually never have to our August celebration in Sacramento of emerge from their charter jets, padded just the 90th anniversary of the enactment of voting rights for women —and even today limos, or corporate offices to engage regular Rose Ann DeMoro is executive director of National voters or even interact with the media. remains contested for some, such as those Nurses United. I SEPTEMBER 2010 W W W. N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G N AT I O N A L N U R S E 11

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