Intro: "Commission led by Kofi Annan says the rise of Super Pacs and voter ID laws has 'shaken citizen confidence' in elections."

Protesters unveil a banner at the Lincoln Memorial to protest the Citizens United ruling. The Annan report criticizes the ruling for shaking Americans' confidence in the political process. (photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

US Election System Criticized by UN Commission

By Karen McVeigh, Guardian UK

14 September 12

Commission led by Kofi Annan says the rise of Super Pacs and voter ID laws has 'shaken citizen confidence' in elections

S campaign finance rules, which have allowed wealthy individuals to pour millions of dollars into the 2012 presidential election, have shaken public confidence in the political process, according to a report by the Global Commission on Elections, Democracy and Security.

The commission, which is headed by former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, and comprises former world leaders and Nobel prize winners, has identified a rise in "uncontrolled, undisclosed, illegal and opaque" political finance across the world as a key threat to electoral integrity, in a new report due to be launched in the UK on Friday.

The report singles out the US as an example of a country where lack of transparency and controls in political finance have left it struggling to restore the public's confidence in its elected officials to act in their interest.

The commission blamed a series of court decisions - in particular the controversial Citizens United ruling, which turned campaign finance reform on its head and spawned Super Pacs, effectively removing barriers to corporate and union spending to influence elections

Citizens United has "undermined political equality, weakened transparency of the electoral process and shaken citizen confidence in America's political institutions and elections", the report said.

It also criticises US states which have sought to introduce voter identification laws and other measures that have the effect of suppressing African American participation in the political process.

Vidar Helgessen, secretary general of International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, said that US system was cited as just one example of flaws in democracies worldwide. But, he said the US, as the most powerful nation in the world, had a responsibility to set an example.

"If a vast majority of citizens say the systems is undermining political equality and weakening transparency of the electoral process, then there is an issue of trust in the government," he said.

Political finance was an important issue which had not received the attention and reform it deserved, he said.

"We are seeing increasing inequality and we are in a global economic recession and it is an issue that will only grow. It is not only in new and emerging democracies that provide challenges and have elections that lack integrity"

The report cited a national survey this year by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University law school, which found a majority of people believe nominally independent Super Pacs to be a danger to democracy.

"Nearly two-thirds of Americans said that they trust government less because big donors have more influence over election officials than average Americans," the report said.

It concluded that, although Super Pacs must disclose their contributors and may not coordinate directly with candidates by law, in practice, "both constraints have been flouted".

It compared the US unfavourably to Canada, which has faced many of the same campaign finance struggles and concludes: "In contrast to the USA, Canada has managed to strike a balance between safeguarding individuals speech and protecting the overall integrity of the electoral process."

It argued that the rise of "uncontrolled political finance" was one of five major threats to democracy, which could rob it of its unique strengths to promote political equality, the empowerment of the disenfranchised and the ability to manage societal conflicts peacefully.

The report looked at a host of problems, including post-election violence in places such as Kenya and Nigeria, illicit finance in Costa Rica, and disenfranchised populations in Europe.

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+16 # WolfTotem 2012-09-14 08:01

Well, what about international observers to watch and report on the elections? With police protection, of course...

Just about whatever the outcome, Putin will be laughing!

+8 # notsofreespirit 2012-09-14 15:12

You would have to be assuming that the US government would let them observe and report. Our country is exceptional which means we can demand these things of others but don't have to follow them ourselves. "Do as I say, not as I do."

+8 # hobbesian 2012-09-14 19:21

we THINK of ourselves as exceptional; other countries just find us irritating, annoying and full of it.

+8 # Working Class 2012-09-14 09:04

Our government would reject international observers flat out. What both parties,and for that matter the rest of us, should be concerned with is the finding that the ability to "manage societal conflicts peacefully" most likely will be deminished. There will come a time when the public will reflect back on these words:
"...Governments are instituted among men (I add women), deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to institute new Government..."
The rest of The Declaration of Independence ain't bad either. We should ask any person who wants to run for office to recite it. If they can.

+13 # tswhiskers 2012-09-14 09:55

Our current political climate should embarrass every American. The UN talks of us as if we were (are) a 3d world country or perhaps a new democracy like those in the Middle East when in fact we are the world's oldest republic. Unfortunately I don't see our political climate changing until we overcome our greed, at all social and economic levels of society. The super wealthy are bloated gluttons, e.g. the Kochs who think they are entitled to take even the food out of childrens' mouths. The poor and middle classes, finding that they can't take their jobs and wages for granted, are greedy for every hour of work and every penny they can find to support their families. This has to begin at the top of our society. Until the wealthy can learn to be content with a relatively few millions instead of countless billions in their bank and other accounts, until people can begin to feel reasonably secure in their employment, the US economy will remain the unsteady symbol of greed that it is today. In spite of some disagreement between mgmt. and labor, nearly all Americans lived well for a short while in the 40's thru the 70's. We can do so again if we can all learn to be reasonable.

+6 # mdhome 2012-09-14 11:46

"the Kochs who think they are entitled to take even the food out of childrens' mouths. The poor and middle classes, finding that they can't take their jobs and wages for granted, are greedy for every hour of work and every penny they can find to support their families."

YES, BUT it is the SUPREME COURT that must, SHOULD hang their head in extreme SHAME as they /are the/ WERE the ultimate firewall of democracy. The founding fathers must be spinning in their graves like jet engines!

+1 # hobbesian 2012-09-14 19:24

Yes; agreed; if you want it put clearly, get the New Yorker article by Jeffrey Toobin; you won't be able to put it down, and when you finish reading it you will be horrified; our whole FDR structure, gutted. The thing, incidentally, that made us great. When the relative difference between lowest paid employees and the bosses was only 40:1.

0 # mdhome 2012-09-14 11:49

We can do so again if we can all learn to be reasonable.
Good luck with that! Is our only hope to return to reason a 2nd amendment solution? I hope not.

+1 # Working Class 2012-09-14 12:54

Quoting mdhome:

We can do so again if we can all learn to be reasonable.
Good luck with that! Is our only hope to return to reason a 2nd amendment solution? I hope not.

I for one do not support a 2nd Amendment solution. The Move to Amend solution makes more sense and is in keeping with the dynamic self-government model our Founders had in mind.

+1 # Regina 2012-09-15 06:20

Only with muskets!

+2 # WolfTotem 2012-09-14 15:11

Quoting tswhiskers:

Until the wealthy can learn to be content with a relatively few millions instead of countless billions in their bank and other accounts, until people can begin to feel reasonably secure in their employment, the US economy will remain the unsteady symbol of greed that it is today.

"Unsteady". You can say that again. No engineer would build a cock-eyed, top-heavy structure like that and expect it to stand.

I spoke to a "normally" wealthy and very conservative lady the other day. She had just seen a fleet of billionaires' jumbo bath toys ("yachts", they call them)and the experience scared her. She understood at once the danger for society of such a yawning gulf in wealth at a time when so many are poor, even starving. I guess she's sensitive. The mega-rich, however, seem to have taken leave of the real world, and of their senses.

Yet Americans adore them and vote for them.

Here, I'll quote, not Marx, but Adam Smith:

"The disposition to admire and almost worship the rich and the powerful is the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments."

Almost???

+9 # HowardMH 2012-09-14 10:08

Tswhiskers that is the problem – there are too many millions of so called Americans that are too stupid to even be embarrassed.
Don't blame Mitt or any other millionaire for how little they pay in taxes. Blame the millions of IDIOTS that voted for the politicians that passed the laws that allow the rich to continue screwing everyone else that earns a modest paycheck.
Until there are two hundred thousand really, really pissed off people on Capital Hill (all at the same time) raising some serious hell against the Lunatics, absolutely nothing is ever, ever going to happen to these totally bought and paid for by the richest 50 people in the world that are becoming more and more powerful with each passing rigged election thanks to the stupid people.

+3 # AMLLLLL 2012-09-14 11:34

My one addition here is that Romney and his ilk will do anything to maintain the status quo, if not lower their taxes. It's clinging to these policies that we have to overcome. Vote; and get your friends to the polls, especially the disenfranchised .

+7 # reiverpacific 2012-09-14 10:29

Electoral College + Citizens United = anything but democracy.
It's all tilted, and tilting further, towards the Corporate State -and you know what that is, right?!

+3 # Kwelinyingi 2012-09-14 11:33

When democracy is for sale to the highest bidder, then only the rich and mighty will call the shots. Many of us cheerfully and dutifully go to the polling booths to enable the rich. Unless big money is taken out of the election equation, expect more of the same. Politicians depending on campaign funds and handouts from the rich will naturally want to return the favor. Nothing strange here.

+5 # mdhome 2012-09-14 11:40

I hope the Supreme Court is deeply ashamed of their selling out to mega-monied corporations. They certainly should be, as their actions have shown the world how little democracy is actually found in the USA.

+3 # hobbesian 2012-09-14 19:28

You forget; Clarence Thomas is on the supreme court; and Alito, and the rest...and it is Roberts's Joy of joys that he was able to manipulate this demolition of all the best of our system; the infrastructure of our success. Wiped out. and more to come, to the delight of the already overly rich, who just have so much money they don't need to have any "income" and therefore don't have to pay tax.

0 # Regina 2012-09-15 06:25

The current bare majority represents only the presidents who appointed them. Dubya smirked and chortled over Roberts, who was young enough to remain in his chief's seat for a long time.

+3 # rhgreen 2012-09-14 13:11

The right wing, especially the religious right (e.g. Ryan, Bachman) has always ranted against the UN, saying it is trying to control the US & stop it from carrying out its mission and from exercising its sovereignty and from beaming American exceptionalism to unfortunate other nations. Hey, how can Armageddon come about properly if the UN is always interfering and trying to make peace? And here is the chief satan, the former UN Sec'y Gen'l telling us how to run our own country, telling us it isn't better than all the other countries! Don't kid yourself - this is exactly how the people who need to change (or be dis-empowered)w ill react to this.

0 # wherefore 2012-09-14 18:02

reiverpacific: The electoral college is not necessarily an impediment to democracy. It exists to lessen the power of large-populatio n states relative to smaller states. The United States is a federal republic, not a democracy, whatever that would be. The president is elected by the states, not by the people. While we would have had Al Gore as president if the Electoral College did not exist, overall all we would have a very different sort of country if we erased the structure of state governments and national government. Maybe that would be a good thing, but if the national government went even more rogue than it is, we would have no recourse in the states.

+2 # Regina 2012-09-15 06:29

And now we have the Republican Governors' Association manipulating state laws to block voters who disagree with them, and might be expected to vote against their pre-selected candidates. That's a Nazi-style putsch.

0 # spenel334 2012-09-15 18:51

Few of the middle class or poor understand that the rich are rich because they are taking money from everyone else. Many believe that the rich earn their money. No one EARNS $50 million dollar bonuses; they take it.
The word 'earn' has within it's definition, 'value', meaning that the effort and value of what the person does, enables him or her to be paid, or pay him or herself, that sum of money. But no 'end' is worth, that much, and certainly not what bankers, or predatory lenders do.
Also, the rich, with all their lobbyists and $, are able to convince average people that what is in the best interests of the rich, is in their best interest as well. That, of course, is a total lie, but what's new? So many of us see it clearly, but seem unable to do much about it except bitch.

+1 # RMDC 2012-09-16 04:19

Things are really a lot worse than this article points out. The system has been totally broken for quite a long time. Congressional districts are so gerrymandered that the party in power pretty much gets to name who will be elected. Out of state money controls local elections.

I doubt if it can be reformed. Who would do the reforming? Congress! The system will collapse pretty soon, maybe this november. It will be so clear to everyone that the elected government is really a bought and paid for product of corporations and banks that no one will credit it with any legitimacy. The USG depends upon "the consent of the governed" for its legitimacy and powers. There may be no "consent of the governed" after this November. The vote will be openly regarded as a PR stunt organized and carried out by the billionaire class.

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