Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that the Democratic establishment has acknowledged that it is corrupt and has decided the corruption must be expelled.

I'm saying that the Democratic establishment has acknowledged that the voters are fully aware that the party is corrupt and they now have no choice but to make modest reforms to address this public relations problem.

This is why the very first bill of House Democrats will be an anti-corruption bill.



House Democrats unveiled details of their first bill in the new Congress on Friday — a sweeping anti-corruption bill aimed at stamping out the influence of money in politics and expanding voting rights. This is House Resolution 1 — the first thing House Democrats will tackle after the speaker’s vote in early January. To be clear, this legislation has little-to-no chance of passing the Republican-controlled Senate or being signed by President Donald Trump.

Senate Dems will also join in with this political stunt.



The only thing this will do is highlight that the GOP is even more corrupt than the Democrats, a fact that the American voters are gradually recognizing.



A majority of respondents in 48 GOP-held congressional districts believe Republicans are “more corrupt” than Democrats, according to a new poll from a progressive policy group. Politico reported that 54 percent of respondents from the GOP districts said in the online survey administered by the Center for American Progress that Republicans are more corrupt. Of those surveyed, 46 percent said they believe Democrats are more corrupt.

Voters are also losing faith in the Republicans ability to fight corruption, but most still doubt the Dems will do much against corruption either.

That being said, the DNC has passed important and significant reforms this past year.

It wasn't just limiting the powers of the superdelegates. They've also taken an important step towards empowering the grassroots.



Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez is setting a kind of cover charge to get onstage for the Democratic presidential primary debates, but not just any money will do. In addition to the usual polling metrics required to join the debate, candidates will also have to meet a to-be-determined criteria for “grassroots fundraising.” Including small-dollar fundraising as a necessary element for debate participation would have two effects. First, it incentivizes candidates to invest — strategically, financially, and emotionally — in growing a small-donor base. Second, it will force potential billionaire self-funders like Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer, and Howard Schultz to demonstrate some level of popular enthusiasm for their campaigns, meaning they can’t just flash their own cash and buy their way onstage.

These are big steps, and they deserve to be acknowledged. But at the same time, just like the House anti-corruption bill, there are huge loopholes in this reform.



That may seem like an extreme example, but take New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s 2018 campaign. In his July campaign finance report, eager to blunt the grassroots credentials of challenger Cynthia Nixon, Cuomo touted that 57 percent of his campaign’s contributions came from people giving $250 or less. Seems pretty good, until you look at the money coming from those contributions, which amounts to only 1 percent of Cuomo’s $6 million haul from that reporting period. Sixty-nine of Cuomo’s contributions came from a single individual, almost all in $1 increments — and the donor just happened to be the roommate of a campaign staffer.

The real significance of these reform bills is that it's evidence that in smokey backrooms, the Democratic Party has acknowledged the problem, and that they must appear to do something about it.

It's actually second-nature for the Democratic establishment, which still shamelessly pretends that it represents the working class.

The problem for the Dems is that fancy rhetoric and symbolic gestures are fooling fewer and fewer people.



Most of them are feigning left since 2018, but the other lesson from 2016 is that folks are tired of the Democrats’ tendency to spout progressive rhetoric around election time, then spring back into the neoliberal corporate party that has left most of America behind. Since the days of the DLC and triangulation, Democrats have consistently backed policies that favored the rich at the expense of the rest of us, and people are wise to it.

A real solution to political corruption would be passing a 28th Amendment revoking corporate personhood.