[SapphireSun]

That is true, but the 535 other politicians are nearly all centrists or right wingers. Politicians are beholden to their donors. Eliminate the elite donor class, eliminate their interests being represented. I have some optimism that the Democratic party will be reconfigured to some degree. It's either that, or keep losing cyclically.

FDR won four presidential elections and scared the right so badly that they got a constitutional amendment to limit future "damage" to two terms.

[WaxProlix]

So, GP says "Vote for people who aren't interested in taking bribes" and you say "eliminate the donor class" -- those seem like pretty distinct policy recommendations. How are they related?

[SapphireSun]

GP's literal words were "stop voting for people willing to take lobbyist money". The lobbyists and big donations / bundlers come from the same class of people - the wealthy. These dollars come attached with policy positions that favor that class both explicitly (in terms of policies that are explicitly favored) and implicitly (policies that will not be given strong support, i.e. various forms of redistribution).

The only way to run a modern political campaign is with lots of cash, so the cash must be procured somehow. Your two options are to level the playing field with public funding of campaigns (unlikely to happen in the wake of Citizen's United) or for a candidate to raise small dollar donations. The Sanders campaign proved that the latter is possible.