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Is Billionare Republican Sheldon Adelson Too Powerful?

Is Billionaire Republican Sheldon Adelson To Powerful?

  • Yes

    Votes: 22 57.9%
  • No

    Votes: 16 42.1%

  • Total voters
    38
No. Sheldon Adelson is an individual with a lot of money and connections, that's all.

Money is too powerful in American politics. It needs to be taken out or minimized as much as possible.

Reality-governmen is too powerful in american society. It needs to be minimized as much as possible

then we won't have to worry about billionaires buying the government since it won't be all that valuable to them
 
classic strawman.

no one is arguing to remove anyone's right to free speech. i do not, however, support one person being able to purchase legislation, and neither should you.

And with the recent other SCOTUS ruling, money is freedom of speech.

It seems that the more money you have, the more freedom of speech you have,
a slippery slope indeed.
 
Purchasing legislation is illegal, and should be. Exercising ones right to spend their money as they wish, saying what they wish, and so forth is a fundamental necessity of freedom. Limit it, bar it, or whatever and we are no different then Iran and Cuba.


classic strawman.

no one is arguing to remove anyone's right to free speech. i do not, however, support one person being able to purchase legislation, and neither should you.
 
Purchasing legislation is illegal, and should be.

All Sheldon Adelson wants | Opinion | The Seattle Times


Exercising ones right to spend their money as they wish, saying what they wish, and so forth is a fundamental necessity of freedom. Limit it, bar it, or whatever and we are no different then Iran and Cuba.

one person should not be able to buy legislation because he has more money than the other 330,000,000. this guy is trying to do that.
 
Absolutely. As long as people are allowed to donate such large amounts of money to political campaigns the ultra-rich will inevitably have much more power than they should with regards to our political system.
 
Reality-governmen is too powerful in american society. It needs to be minimized as much as possible

then we won't have to worry about billionaires buying the government since it won't be all that valuable to them

I agree that the government is indeed too powerful and needs to be minimized as much as possible. At the same time, that influence needs to be reduced steadily but gradually, the same way it was increased, or the unintended consequences will be many and varied.

A well-crafted model for eliminating money from politics could turn that money off more or less overnight.
 
Absolutely. As long as people are allowed to donate such large amounts of money to political campaigns the ultra-rich will inevitably have much more power than they should with regards to our political system.

and given they pay far more for funding they government, I don't see a problem with that

what I have a problem with is government is too big
 
I agree that the government is indeed too powerful and needs to be minimized as much as possible. At the same time, that influence needs to be reduced steadily but gradually, the same way it was increased, or the unintended consequences will be many and varied.

A well-crafted model for eliminating money from politics could turn that money off more or less overnight.


the problem is some entities will have more access and power-such as the MSM
 
and given they pay far more for funding they government, I don't see a problem with that

what I have a problem with is government is too big

I don't believe anyone should be able to donate to political campaigns. Money is the number one problem with politics. We should ban political ads like they do in the UK and if you want to run and are one of the main parties candidates the government should give you a small amount to run your campaign, allowing only specific expenses of course, and that will be that. They'll have to run off of their ideas and not be able to buy their way into office.
 
I don't believe anyone should be able to donate to political campaigns. Money is the number one problem with politics. We should ban political ads like they do in the UK and if you want to run and are one of the main parties candidates the government should give you a small amount to run your campaign, allowing only specific expenses of course, and that will be that. They'll have to run off of their ideas and not be able to buy their way into office.

yeah so rich guys will have an advantage.

the best thing to do is allow unlimited contributions but complete disclosures. I don't like given the MSM or unions that much power
 
yeah so rich guys will have an advantage.

the best thing to do is allow unlimited contributions but complete disclosures. I don't like given the MSM or unions that much power

Oh, they can't use their money either. Big part I forgot to add.

So, no one would have a money advantage; they would be running off of their ideas and not money.
 
Oh, they can't use their money either. Big part I forgot to add.

So, no one would have a money advantage; they would be running off of their ideas and not money.

and thus MSM and the unions would have tremendous power
 
the left whines about wealthy people buying government but its the left that made government so much bigger than it should be

This is a great point. I think most of us would like to see a government by the people instead of government by corporate interests. The left opposes government by corporate interests as a cause while their leaders court monied businesses for support, as do republicans. The left also wants the government to be more powerful, so their position is that their party takes money from corporations and wants government to have more power over the people. Republicans want just as much money from corporations but they want government to have less influence over the people, at least in theory.

The bottom line is that both parties are full of it, but the only politicians worth listening to are the ones who favor smaller government. Smaller government is the only way that corporations will have less influence over our lives because of a shift in power back to the people.
 
No. The real problem is that the political system has to much power and influence over our lives, activities and private enterprise. If politicians lacked the power to peddle influence and grant favors, there would be no reason for anyone to attempt to influence them.

Wrong. The real problem is the human greed, anger, and envy that make government necessary in the first place.

It was human greed that led Europeans to engage in the practice of enslaving Africans for profit. It was government that put an end to that. It was human greed that led to the proliferation of counterfeit, contaminated, diluted, and decomposed drugs. It was government that put and end to that. It was human greed that led to the exploitation of young children for the sake of cheap labor. It was government that put and end to that.

The problem with your response is that although you correctly pointed out that government currently has too much influence over our lives, you failed to correctly identify the underlying cause of the problem. As a result of this, your response would have us believe that simply reducing the influence of government will solve the problem, and that simply is not true. While we do need to reduce government influence in some instances, it should be done in such a way that US citizens are protected from the power that wealthy people, which left unchecked, have to inflict unjust suffering on not only the citizens of the US, but the entire world as well.

It is certainly problematic that wealthy individuals currently have too much control over the political system. What is needed is effective mechanisms, e.g. laws, to limit that influence.
 
and thus MSM and the unions would have tremendous power

The people would have the most power. In my scenario, the vote would control the politicians, not billionaires and huge corporations.
 
Wrong. The real problem is the human greed, anger, and envy that make government necessary in the first place.

It was human greed that led Europeans to engage in the practice of enslaving Africans for profit. It was government that put an end to that. It was human greed that led to the proliferation of counterfeit, contaminated, diluted, and decomposed drugs. It was government that put and end to that. It was human greed that led to the exploitation of young children for the sake of cheap labor. It was government that put and end to that.

The problem with your response is that although you correctly pointed out that government currently has too much influence over our lives, you failed to correctly identify the underlying cause of the problem. As a result of this, your response would have us believe that simply reducing the influence of government will solve the problem, and that simply is not true. While we do need to reduce government influence in some instances, it should be done in such a way that US citizens are protected from the power that wealthy people, which left unchecked, have to inflict unjust suffering on not only the citizens of the US, but the entire world as well.

It is certainly problematic that wealthy individuals currently have too much control over the political system. What is needed is effective mechanisms, e.g. laws, to limit that influence.

opinion noted, not shared. The rich are not a monolithic force and for every rich conservative there are at least two wealthy liberals are contributing to what they want-welfare socialism and crony capitalism
 
The people would have the most power. In my scenario, the vote would control the politicians, not billionaires and huge corporations.

disagree. unions and the MSM will have tremendous power if "money is eliminated" from politics
 
If there were laws enacted to ban money from infiltrating Washington DC, and the states in the union, it would look like ghost towns, and that sucking sound we'd hear would be politicians leaving government. They'd be rushing from their political houses and trying to find out how to make an easy dollar.
 
Wrong. The real problem is the human greed, anger, and envy that make government necessary in the first place.

Ah...it is human greed, anger, and envy that lead to government in the first place. :lol:
 
I don't know... let's ask George Soros.
 
disagree. unions and the MSM will have tremendous power if "money is eliminated" from politics

They won't have any more power than the already do; also unions wouldn't be able to donate to political campaigns either, so their power would be greatly reduced.

The greatest power would be returned to the people, the politicians would have to directly talk to us, they would have to serve our needs and not the needs of large corporations and multi-billionaire donors. This is the way a republic is supposed to work, not this ****ed up system we have now.
 
Ah...it is human greed, anger, and envy that lead to government in the first place. :lol:

It is human greed that makes government NECESSARY in the first place. Intelligent, responsible people should first of all recognize that there is a need for government. Furthermore they also have the responsibility to make sure that the greed, anger, and envy of the wealthy do not have an influence on government.

Both things need to be there.
 
I don't know... let's ask George Soros.

He has too much power as well. No one should be able to donate money to political campaigns; we must get money out of politics.
 
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