Here’s how much corporations paid US senators to fast-track the TPP bill/Guardian UK

[dreamnightwind]

53. I don't think you'd have much luck with that

but be my guest, would be interesting.

I was thinking of it as a Citizen's Lobby, crowd-funded.

I have long held the unpopular opinion that we pay our congresspeople way too little money. They work for who pays them, and for who will help them bankroll their reelection. Congressional salaries, and POTUS too, are extremely low considering how hard it is to get those jobs and how important they are. If we could get them to work for us instead of for corrupting corporate money, they'd be worth every penny of it.

Corporations long ago figured out that contributions to congresspeople get a huge return on their investment. I may be way off track here, but I'd think a Citizen's Lobby could also take advantage of this.

I know there are some public interest groups that attempt to do this, but I was trying to imagine it more as providing an alternative for congresspeople who would rather represent us but can't afford to (and I actually think that is a lot of them, and if the alternative is there but they still won't take it, those are the ones we run candidates against).

Obviously the right fix is public financing of elections, that's a great place to put energy, it's a long battle though, in the meantime why not set up a way for them to do the right thing without sacrificing their hopes of reelection? until we find a way to defeat money, we could crowd-source our own Citizens Lobby.