I don't know enough about the republican party's campaign finances to know whether Trump controls most or all of it. Even if he does, though, it doesn't have to work that way.
Congress has a duty to uphold the constitution, not to play political money games. The fact that they aren't willing to is a large part of why we're in this mess.
What we need are leaders that actually have principles they're willing to fight for, and ultimately that still rolls further down hill to the voters who have collectively created these incentives.
When Ron Paul was still in office lobbyists learned to not even bother talking to him. Agree or disagree with him, the man had strong views of how governments should work, was clear about those views to his electorate, and stood by them consistently. We need more of that.
Their point is that without concerted effort the elected officials will follow Trump as long as elections in red states align with Trump's political funding
> Congress has a duty to uphold the constitution, not to play political money games
Those political money games will filter out opposition in congress as long as Trump is able to have yes men elected into congress
Sure, and if both of those problems are fundamentally just how politics is going to work now we'd be better off throwing out the system entirely and starting fresh.
Short of that, we need voters electing based on ideals and principles and we need those elected to actually follow the ideals and principles that got them elected.
Yeah, the issue is one of incentives.
For all politicians, their incentive is to get (re)elected. That's pretty much part of the definition. The ones that follow that incentive are going to be (re)elected, those that don't aren't going to get into office.
But, if you really do believe in democracy, then you have to actually trust the voters here. If you're thinking that they are just rubes and are easily lead around, then well, you don't really believe in democracy, I think [0]. Whatever you think about Donny and his methods and ideas, we've had 10 years of the guy in politics. The voters (in the system we have) were as well informed as you could possibly expect them to be. They wanted him and everything about him, the results were very clear.
Ancient Greece is a good model here with it's many cities and systems. Democracies will often choose the wolf to escape the vultures. It's just part of how humans work. We can all wish that we live in a different place and a different time with different people, but we don't. We're here and now. And our fellow voters in the system we have, they want all of this.
Look, I'm with you, I think that the voters were very dumb here. But they have to find out one way or another and get their comeuppance. There is no feasible other way. We're going to get Donny in all his glory, good and hard.
[0] yes yes, we don't have a democracy, we have a constitutional republic and blah blah blah. We've all heard it a hundred times.
I agree with you here. I do personally believe in democracy, though for a slightly different reason.
I believe in democracy because I think the public should be able to collectively pick their fate and then own the outcome. I don't want an elite class doing what they think is best for the rest of us, and I don't want to own the result of their decisions if I had no say in the decisions.
I live in a very red state. Though I didn't vote for Trump I am surrounded by a strong majority of people that did. I've viewed it the way you're describing from the beginning - we made this bed, now we get to see what the result is and decide what to do next.