Unifying to Treat the Cause of All of our Problems (Instead of dividing to fight the symptoms separately)

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This message is from Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org, an important organizing fighting to solve the climate crisis and push for policies that will put the world on track to get to 350 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere (which is the acceptable level for our planet; we are currently at 392 ppm).

But he doesn't talk about the parts per million of carbon dioxide in this message to his member-base. Instead he gives a message that I hope is repeated and sent all over the world and gets into the hands of every occupier of every city and state: our personal, and professional, issues are many but, instead of fighting separate battles, let us unify behind this cause to address the root.

The left has been too divided to do anything more than get Obama elected for many years. In my life, other than the Obama presidential campaign, I haven't really seen a united and strong left. I've seen a weak and spineless Democratic party that is hardly any further to the left of center than the Republican party is to the right of it. And the united push for Obama gave me hope for change (I wonder what made me think that was coming..), I felt proud to be a part of the left when I saw Obama sworn into the White House. And while I sure as hell am glad I didn't see John McCain get sworn in, my passion and pride has wained recently because Obama joined the ranks of all those politicians - left and right - who had favors to return once he arrived into his new position in DC.

I'm not saying Obama planned and plotted to unify the left, ride their passion to the presidency and then turn on them - I don't think life or politics are ever that simple. Though it is a nice narrative and I can understand why many members of the 'real' left have started using it. No, I think its more complicated than that - what can we expect a politician to do when it costs millions just to run a campaign? Go door to door asking for singles or panhandle for quarters on the subway? If they want to spend any time at all doing anything other than fundraising (discussing issues, drafting policy, their current jobs, etc)- they need big bucks and fast.

The 2008 campaign was the costliest in history, with a record-shattering $5.3 billion in spending by candidates, political parties and interest groups on the congressional and presidential races.
["2008 Costliest..." Nov 5, 2008. Politico] 

Useful nay-sayer says:
"but Mark, I don't care about campaign reform - thats not my issue - I'm protesting against the process of hydrofracking which is ruining our..."


I know what hydrofracking is.
I also know what the wealth gap is between the racial groups in America,
and I know the income gap between men and women,
and I know that there are groups of people that don't identify as 'men' or 'women',
and I know how cows are treated on Tyson's CAFOs that go into McDonald burgers,
and I know that its silly that marijuana is still illegal,
and I know capitalism and consumerism are rotting our souls,
and I know the education system is killing our children's imaginations and not teaching them anything,
and I know that none of this will matter if we don't get our act together and stop ruining this planet's fragile ecosystem.

I know all this - I'm not trying to diminish or belittle any of these issues, but I'm trying to say that they are symptoms of a larger problem here. We can all go our own ways and each raise money from similar pools of working class supporters, the fruits of which will be pennies compares to the millions that some corporations might put through the laundry in their suit pockets by accident. Almost every one of the issues listed above, comes with a large, multi-national corporation which stands to benefit from legislation opposing the cause. And it just so happens that each of these corporations made some generous contribution to the senator who heads the committee on [_your_issue_goes_here_].

Think this is starting to sound like conspiracy theories? Well, lets consider a real world example:

"Goldman Sachs, one of Wall Street’s most prestigious investment banks, was also among the many banks in 2008 and 2009 to receive billions of dollars in taxpayer money to help it stay afloat. Like others in the securities industry, Goldman Sachs advises and invests in nearly every industry affected by federal legislation. The firm closely monitors issues including economic policy, trade and nearly all legislation that governs the financial sector. It has been a major proponent of privatizing Social Security as well as legislation that would essentially deregulate the investment banking/securities industry." [Source: OpenSecrets.org]

Goldman Sachs has contributed a total of $20,194,745 to campaign funds between 1990 and 2010 [Source: OpenSecrets.org].  No, I didn't comb through the FEC's documents for the last 21 years of campaign contributions to get this number - the Center for Responsive Politics does it for us. (Spend an hour on their website, your view of our political system just might be forever shifted).

I realize that the Goldman Sachs bit was a tangent but I'm making a point: organizations of working-class people in favor of wall st reform and regulation enforcement don't have $20 Million dollars to match the influence Goldman Sachs has (oh, and don't forget about paying for lobbyists - GS has already spent $2.4 million on lobbying, this year (2011) alone!

We can't match them and WE SHOULDN'T HAVE TO.

Admittedly, we dropped our guard a few times (in May 1886, April 1978, January 2010, for example) and allowed the corporations to grab the reigns of this democracy - but I believe the power and support of the Occupy movement can become the first unified offensive against this trend. We cannot wait for congress to get to this issue on their own because they never will - there's nothing in it for them. There is no corporation paying big money to get this legislation pushed through the red tape and onto the floor. So how will it happen? Well, maybe in the first large show of the power of the people in a long time, we can demand this issue be addressed.

Unify because addressing the influence of corporate money in our politics IS addressing environmental issues, animal rights issues, gender politics issues, etc. Making the American government more accountable to the people (to all people, by the way, not just to liberals), is in everyone's best interest. Unless, of course, you are the CEO of a corporation that makes profit from exploitation, in which case I suggest you start working on a new business plan, because the tides are changing in America.