Selling Out America’s Democracy: How Lobbyists, Special Interests, and Campaign Financing Undermine the Will of the People

America’s historic greatness is in decline, subverted by moneyed special interests and their lobbyists who take advantage of our system of campaign financing to thwart the will of the people. Monuments to the impact of factions include inadequate efforts to curb global warming, infrequent increases in the minimum wage, no universal healthcare, unchecked inner-city crime, and limited stem cell research. Ineffective political leadership, corroded by special interest manipulation, has landed the nation in foreign intervention that takes American lives and spends obscene amounts of U.S. resources. Moss portrays the motivations and methods of those who corrupt our political system and betray the legitimate interests of the American people. He quantifies the gains reaped by beneficiaries of lobbyist successes.

Selling Out America’s Democracy focuses on Washington insiders who serve the interests of narrow factions that seek to control the national agenda. Telling interviews represent the views of Congressional and think tank staff, lobbyists, media experts, foreign diplomats, and nonprofit citizen advocacy groups. Moss concludes by advancing a program of policy changes calculated to revive our democracy.