[bush-bby]

Please don’t take this personally, but fuck I hate this painfully common assertion. We most absolutely live in a democracy. However sometimes it’s easy to get confused as to what that means. Democrats (as opposed to autocrats or oligarchs) must behave in ways that will get them the votes they need to stay in power. Is there anyone in particular enabling this? No. If there was, they either would not get re-elected, or constituents have decided that this is not enough a transgression to vote for someone else. Maybe a case could be made for lack of knowledge or high ignorance amongst the common voter contributing to poor outcome of democratic processes, but to say we don’t have a democracy is irrational. No one forces you to vote for anyone. You don’t like someone in power? Get rid of them! You can do that here…but unfortunately one of the benefits of democracy, is you need a group to enact change and policy, not an autocratic individual.

[sumedh]

> I hate this painfully common assertion. We most absolutely live in a democracy.

> Get rid of them! You can do that here

No you cannot, the US has gerrymandering which makes it very difficult to get rid of politicians in local/state races.

[bush-bby]

Does gerrymandering exist in an autocracy?

[Guest42]

By singling out Democrats, are you claiming that the Koch brothers and Sheldon Adelson haven’t influenced the government in ways that are beyond the scope of what citizens should be capable of?

[TchoBeer]

GP didn't mean Democrats as in the party, but rather Democrats as in the people in charge under a democracy, i.e. Democrats as opposed to Oligarchs

[netizen-936824]

They mean "democrat" as the people who practice democracy, not the US political party

[nlittlepoole]

Their influence largely comes from their ability to buy media timethrough PACs. Direct contributions to politicians is still highly regulated. You could argue that they can wield influence by threatning current politicans to fund the campaigns of competitors but at the end of the day this still happens through PACs buying media campaigns.

The influence of the Koch's or Adelson is largely hinged on the fact that Americans don't use critical thinking when consuming their media. Rather than trying to find a way to wiggle around the first ammendment when it comes to spending on speech, why not try to build an electorate capable of critical thinking? If you don't think that's possible, then what's the point of any of this?

[KiranRao0]

While I can't be sure, I believe the commenter is referring to "democrats" (an actor in a democratic government) and not "Democrats" (actors within a political party in the US). Correct me if I'm wrong.