Can you bribe the whole electorate?

Unidentified Male
… because I do trust the People to pretty much do the right things. I certainly trust the People to do the right things more than I trust the politicians. For example, there was something I think Professor Allen was talking about earlier today relating to the idea that the counterintuitive concept that the bigger the disparity between resources, the more likely the under resourced position was to win, which was sort of surprise to me, but I have actually experienced that in some levels in the past.

And I guess the reason for that is that although you can bring a pile of money to Gucci Gulch on Capital Hill and pretty much assure yourself of the result you want, at least until you become very public like the Enron people have, but I assure you that for the Enron, for every Enron, there are probably a thousand others who are still there with their bags of money, then you can be confident. But if you’re trying to bribe, let’s say even 20% of the electorate, it’s a lot tougher. You’ve got to do something like Social Security to do that, you know, and right now, when you think about it, as to the point you were making about folks actually saying, “Vote for me and I’ll listen to you if I have time.” Well that’s not really the issue. What they are really saying is, “Vote for me and I’ll send you a check,” because more than 50% of American households get a check from the government every month. And that’s a fact that I think is verifiable. So in essence, we’re buying their loyalty. I think it’s tougher to do that if you’re in an initiative campaign than it would be if you’re lobbying on Capital Hill. So I’m not so afraid of majority rule.

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