Chamber of Commerce Edwards Soundbite

Today, The Los Angeles Times is running a front page story about the United States Chamber of Commerce and the 2008 election.

We plan to build a grass-roots business organization so strong that when it bites you in the butt, you bleed," chamber President Tom Donohue said.

Tom Hamburger reports that even though the Chamber of Commerce, and all the corporations the Chamber of Commerce represents, can't vote in elections, they can still control the election process by flooding the airwaves with attack ads and pro-corporate candidate media buys that use mass media technology and psycho-marketing research to influence voters about candidates.

Hamburger reports that,

A weak record of job creation, the sub-prime mortgage crisis, declining home values and other problems have all helped make the economy a major campaign issue.

Reacting to what it sees as a potentially hostile political climate, Donohue said, the chamber will seek to punish candidates who target business interests with their rhetoric or policy proposals, including congressional and state-level candidates.

So, regardless of any democratic purpose to holding elections in order to have voters select the leaders who represent their views, the Chamber of Commerce wants to make sure non-voting interests prevail and filter the candidates' messages to voters before the elections.

"I'm concerned about anti-corporate and populist rhetoric from candidates for the presidency, members of Congress and the media," he said. "It suggests to us that we have to demonstrate who it is in this society that creates jobs, wealth and benefits -- and who it is that eats them."

Whether he realizes it or not, Donohue is expressing the very problem the populists are fighting: big money, special interest election buying.

He's making the case for Edwards and Kucinich that we need publicly financed elections and strict media regulation of political advertisements.