What that means is that in numerous races throughout America, this election season, you are hearing from certain candidates almost entirely because a single wealthy man willed it into happening. He is able to pump enough money into any single local campaign to insert his preferred candidate, regardless of whether that candidate had any constituency other than himself. A single wealthy man can swing whichever election he wants, anywhere in America, based entirely on his own whim.

That's the model we're now following. And it's not just Uihlein, of course, but other wealthy Americans as well; from Newt Gingrich to Rick Santorum to, say, Wisconsin's Kevin Nicholson, becoming an American billionaire's personal project is an attainable path to "public" office. No need to bother with retail politics, or building a constituency, or any of the rest of it; find a single man to write a sufficiently large check (albeit to a super PAC, to keep our thin veneer of dignity intact) and you can ride to instant contention in any race.

This is all made possible if a single wealthy benefactor, a single corporate or banking or fuckabout titan, can be found who prefers your positions to those of the other candidates. And, as anyone not a member of the United States Supreme Court can quickly glean, it provides rich potential rewards to any ambitious politician willing to change their ideological stances to best court their very own sugar daddy. There is no need to bribe a politician once in office; simply choose the politician most willing to interpret America through your own lens, and buy him.

That is precisely what America's wealthy ideologues are doing. Perhaps they believe they are doing the nation a favor; perhaps they merely want to ensure that whatever the government does stays well clear of their own businesses and pocketbooks. But they are doing it, either way.